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AMERICANA GERMANICA 

New Series 

monographs devoted to the comparative 
study of the 

Literary, Linguistic and Otlier Cultural Relations 

OF 

Germany and America 



EDITOR 

MARION DEXTER LEARNED 
University of Pennsylvania 



AMERICANA GERMANICA 

New Series 

1. Translations of German Poetry in American 

Magazines 1^4.1-1810. By Edward Ziegler 
Davis, Ph. D. 5 p.l. 229 pp. Price . . $1.65 

2. The Harmony Society. A Chapter in 

German American Culture History. By 
John Archibald Bole, Ph. D. 3 p.l. 176 
pp. 30 Illustrations. Price $1.50 

3. Friedrich Schiller in America. A Contribu- 

tion to the Literature of the Poet's 
Centenary, 1905. By EUwood Comly 
Parry, Ph. D. i p.l. 116 pp. Price . $1.25 

4. The Influence of Salomon Gessner Upon 

English Literature. By Bertha Reed. 

I p.l. 118 pp. Price $1-25 

5. Ihe Germa7i Settletnent Society of Philadel- 

phia a7id its Colo7iy, Hermann^ Missouri. 

By William G. Bek. Pp. xi, 182. Price $1.50 

6. Philipp Waldeck's Diary of the American 

Revolution. With Introduction and Pho- 
tographic Reproductions. By M. D. 
Learned. 168 pp. Price $1.50 

7. Schwenkfelder Hymnology and the Sources 

of the First Schwenkfelder Hymn- Book 
Printed in America. With Photographic 
Reproductions. By Allen Anders Seipt, 
Ph.D. 112 pp. Price $2.00 

8. The Settlement of the German Coast of 

Louisiana and the Creoles of Gerinan 
Descent. By J. Hanno Deiler, 135 pp. 
Price $1-25 



AMERICANA GERMANICA 



The Sehlement of the German 
Coast of Louisiana 



AND 



The Creoles of German Descent 



By J. Hanno DkilKR, 

Professor Emeritus of German in the Tulane University of Louisiana, 
New Orleans, La. 



AMERICANA GERMANICA PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA 
1909 



^ '380 



COPYRIGHTED BY J. H. DEILER 
1909 



H^ - 



CONTENTS 



Page 

The Discovery of the Mississippi i 

The First German on the Lower Mississippi 3 

The First French Settlement on the Gulf Coast 6 

A Grave Error 8 

The Western Company and the Compagnie des Indes — John Law lo 

A German Description of Louisiana in the Year 1720 11 

Ten Thousand Germans on the Way to Louisiana 14 

How Many of These Reached Louisiana 15 

French Colonists I7 

Arrival of the First Immigration en Masse 18 

A Misstatement 19 

How the Immigrants Were Received and Provided For — A Terrible State 

of Affairs 21 

Germans in Pascagoula 25 

Pest Ships 27 

Charlotte von Braunschweig-Wolfenbuettel 31 

John Law, a Bankrupt and a Fugitive 36 

The Germans Leave Law's Concession 37 

The Family of D'Arensbourg 38 

The German Coast 46 

The First Villages on the German Coast So 

Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg and the Founders of the Secon(f German 

Village on, the German Coast 52 

Hardships and Difficulties Encountered 56 

Troubles With the Indians 59 

Better Times 62 

Churches of the Germans 62 

The Census of 1721 66 

Koly. 70 

Continuation of the Census of 1721 — Remarks and Observations TZ 

Names of German Habitants — Official Census of 1724 ^^ 

Map of the Principal Forts and Trading Posts 78 

Additional German Names of This Period Not in the Census 96 

The Zweig-Labranche Family 100 

Additional German Names 102 

A Census Without a Date 103 

Reinforcements for the Germans — Manchac 105 

The Germans from Maryland 107 

The Kleinpeter Family 108 

The Ory Family 109 



Contents 

Page 

The Creoles of German Descent— Definition of the Word "Creole" iii 

What is the Probable Number of the Creoles of German Descent ii6 

The German Language Among the Creoles of Louisiana ii8 

The Fate of the German Family Names Among the Creoles 119 

German Names in the Spanish Marriage Register of St. John the Baptist. . 126 

Conclusion 127 

Official Acknowledgment of the Worth and Value of the German Pioneers 

of Louisiana — Laussat's Letter 129 

Appendix — The German Waldeck Regiment and the Sixtieth or "Royal 

American Regiment on Foot" in the War of 1779 to 1781 131 



THE SETTLEMENT OF THE GERMAN COAST OF 

LOUISIANA 

AND 

THE CREOLES OF GERMAN DESCENT. 



The Discovery of the Mississippi. 

The first German upon the lower Mississippi was one of the 
last companions of the French explorer, La Salle. As the found- 
ing of the first settlement of Germans on the lower Mississippi 
also took place at a very early period in the history of Louisi- 
ana, we will first cast a glance into the history of the discovery 
of the Mississippi and the taking possession of the northern gulf 
coast by the French. 

With the second voyage of Columbus (1493) ^.nd the dis- 
covery of Cuba, Hayti, Porto Rico, Dominica, Jamaica, and 
Guadeloupe, Spain had become the mistress of the Gulf of 
Mexico. Twenty years later Ponce de Leon came to Florida, 
and in 15 19 Cortez began the conquest of the Aztec empire of 
Mexico. In the same year another Spaniard, by the name of 
Pifieda, sailed from Jamaica to circumnavigate Florida, which 
at that time was still thought to be an island; and as he always 
sailed along the northern gulf coast, he finally reached Mexico. 
For a long time it was believed that Piiieda on this voyage had 
discovered the Mississippi and called it "Rio del Espiritu Santo" ; 
but Hamilton, in his "Colonial Mobile," maintains that the river 
discovered by Pineda was not the Mississippi, but the Mobile 
River, and that Pifieda passed the mouth of the Mississippi with- 



2 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

out noticing it, it being hidden by sand banks, drift wood, and 
bushes. 

In 1528 an expedition to Florida led by Panfilo de Nar- 
vaez failed, but, in April, 1536, four of its members, among 
whom was Gabeza de Vaca, reached Mexico by land after many 
years of wandering. These men must have crossed the Missis- 
sippi on their way to Mexico, and from their voyage and that 
of Pineda date the claims of Spain for the ownership of the whole 
northern gulf coast from Florida to Mexico. 

Induced by de Vaca's glowing descriptions of the country, 
De Soto, in 1539, began his adventurous expedition from Florida 
into the interior. About the 30th degree of latitude, he discovered 
the Mississippi (April, 1541) and found his grave in it; where- 
upon Moscoso, with the remnants of the expedition, floated down 
the Mississippi and reached the Spanish possessions on the gulf 
coast. This discovery was without any practical results, how- 
ever, as no second attempt to reach the mouth of the Mississippi 
was made for the next 140 years. 

Meanwhile the French had set foot on Canada (Port Royal, 
later called Annapolis, 1605; Quebec, 1608) and discovered the 
upper Mississippi. Many years, however, passed before La Salle, 
coming from Canada, followed the great river southward in its 
whole length, reached its mouth, and there, on the 9th of April, 
jQt "Louisiana," in honor of the king of France, Louis XIV. Then 
\1682, took possession of the Mississippi valley for France, calling 
he returned by the same way to Canada, and thence went to 
France to report on his discoveries and submit his plan to estab- 
lish communication between Canada and the Gulf of Mexico by 
means of the Mississippi, and to secure the Indian trade of these 
vast regions by a chain of forts. 

La Salle's propositions found favor with the king of France, 
and on the 24th of July, 1684, he sailed from La Rochelle for 
the Gulf of Mexico, intending thence to enter the Mississippi and 
to found on its banks a French establishment. He brought with 
him a flotilla of four vessels (Le Joli, L'Aimable, La Belle and a 
small ketch) under the direct command of Beaujeu. On this 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 3 

voyage a stop was made in the port of Petit Gouave in San 
Domingo, where La Salle was quite sick. San Domingo was 
then and had been for many years the headquarters of the buc- 
caneers, whose calling was at that time considered a quite legiti- 
mate business, the riches of the Spanish silver ships and the many 
obstructions to commerce in Central and South America having, 
so to speak, provoked the other nations to smuggling and piracy. 
Merchants and many other highly respectable people of Europe 
furnished and sent out privateers, and rejoiced at their golden 
harvests. French, English and Dutch adventurers soon congre- 
gated in San Domingo, and these were joined by many Germans 
who had grown up in the wild times of the Thirty Years' War, 
and could not find their way back to peaceful occupations. In this 
company La Salle's men gave themselves up to riotous living, in 
consequence of which many fell victims to disease, and La 
Salle was compelled to enlist new men. 



The First German on the Lower Mississippi. 

Among the new men engaged in San Domingo by La Salle 
was a German, a buccaneer, an artillerist, who was known only 
by the name of "Hans ;" i. e., Johannes, John. The French wrote 
his name "Hiens," but Hennepin, a Dutch contemporary, calls 
him "Hans," and all agree that he was a German. 

The record of La Salle's attempt to find the mouth of the 
Mississippi River from the Gulf of Mexico reveals a series of 
quarrels between the commanders, of misfortunes, errors and 
malice. 

One of the four ships of his flotilla laden with thirty tons of 
ammunition and utensils and tools for his new colony, was cap- 
tured by the Spaniards near San Domingo, because Beaujeu 
refused to follow the course recommended by La Salle. 

The mouth of the Mississippi was not found by this expedi- 
tion, principally because La Salle, on coming down from Canada 
and discovering it, in 1682, had committed the almost incon- 



4 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

ceivable mistake of ascertaining only the latitude of the mouth 
of the river, but not its longitude. 

The expedition landed in Matagorda Bay, in Texas (Febru- 
ary, 1685), where the frigate L'Aimable, on attempting to enter 
a river, was stranded. Joutel, an eyewitness, says : 

"Circumstances reported by the ship's crew and those who saw 
the management were infallible tokens and proofs that the mischief 
had been done designedly, which was one of the blackest and most 
detestable actions man could be guilty of." (Joutel's Journal, Stiles, 
page 83.) 

Then Beaujeu abandoned La Salle, left with La Joli for 
France, and took the crew of L'Aimable with him, thus violating 
his agreement with La Salle, and leaving the latter behind with 
the La Belle with eight cannon and not a single cannon ball. 
Finally, La Belle ran aground and was also lost. 

La Salle then built a fort in Texas (Fort St. Louis) for the 
protection of his people, and from there made several attempts 
to find the "fatal river," as he called the Mississippi. 

On one of these expeditions, which brought them up to the 
Coenis Indians, Hans, the German buccaneer, almost lost his 
life. They were crossing a river, when Hans, "a German from 
Wittenburg" (so Father Anastasius, a priest accompanying the 
expedition, calls him) got stuck so fast in the mud "that he could 
scarcely get out." La Salle named the river "Hans River," and in 
the accompanying map, printed in 1720, the name may be found 
inscribed in the French spelling "Riviere Hiens." 

On the 7th of January, 1687, the last expedition from the 
Texas fort was begun. This was to be a desperate attempt to 
march with a picked crew of seventeen men from Texas over- 
land to Canada to get succor, and on the way there to find the 
"fatal river." Among the selected seventeen was Hans, the 
German buccaneer, a proof that La Salle thought well of him. 
Twenty persons, among whom were seven women, were left 
behind in the Texas fort, where they eventually perished. 

For several months this brave little band of seventeen men, 
marching again toward the territory of the Coenis Indians, cut 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 5 

their way through the wilderness, until they came to the southern 
branch of the Trinity River, where, owing to the tyranny of 
their leader, a conspiracy was formed among a portion of the 
men, and on the i8th of March, 1687, La Salle was killed by 
Duhaut, a Frenchman, who wanted to succeed him in the com- 
mand of the expedition. 

In this plan Duhaut, of whom all seem to have been afraid, 
was openly defied by Hans, the German buccaneer, and Father 
Anastasius, an eye witness, reports as follows: 

"Those who most regretted the murder of their commander 
and leader had sided with Hiens, who, seizing his opportunity, two 
days after sought to punish crime by crime. In our presence he 
shot the murderer of La Salle through the heart with a pistol. He 
died on the spot, unshriven, unable even to utter the names of Jesus 
and Mary. Hiens also wished to kill L'Archeveque and thus com- 
pletely avenge the death of La Salle, but Joutel conciliated him." 

When the little band approached the French post on the 
Arkansas River, where, Hans thought, punishment was awaiting 
him for the murder of Duhaut, the German buccaneer resolved to 
join the Coenis Indians, whom he had helped to fight a hostile 
tribe; but, before leaving his companions, he demanded from 
them a Latin certificate to the effect that he was innocent of 
La Salle's death. This he received. 

Only a few of La Salle's last companions reached Canada. 
Two of them, Father Anastasius and Joutel, published accounts 
of La Salle's last voyage, which have been followed in this nar- 
rative. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Map of Louisiana. 
By J. Fried. Gleditschen's Son, Leipsic, 1720. 




The First French Settlement on the Gulf Coast. 

Ten years passed before steps were again taken to found a 
French settlement on the northern gulf coast. In 1698, Iber- 
ville, a Canadian, sailed with four ships from the French port 
of Brest for the Gulf of Mexico. He found that in the mean- 
time the Spaniards had taken possession of Pensaoola Bay, for 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 7 

which reason he sailed further west, discovered Mobile Bay on 
the last of January, 1699, and, leaving his big ships in the 
harbor of Ship Island, went with two barges in search of the 
mouth of the Mississippi, which he entered on the second day of 
March. After ascending the river as far as the village of the 
Oumas, opposite the mouth of Red River, he sent his barges 
back to the mouth of the Mississippi, while he with two canoes 
entered Bayou Manchac, discovered Lakes Maurepas and Pont- 
chartrain, and reached Ship Island by this route in advance of 
his barges. 

Despairing of getting his big ships over the bar of the Mis- 
sissippi, he resolved to make a settlement on the coast of the 
Gulf of Mexico; and on the 8th of April, 1699, active work was 
begun at the present site of the town of Ocean Springs, Missis- 
sippi, on "Fort Maurepas," the first French establishment in 
Louisiana. 

The main settlement, however, was "Fort Louis de la 
Louisiane," founded in 1702, "sixteen leagues from Massacre 
(Dauphine) Island, at the second bluff" on the Mobile River. 

"Sixteen leagues from Massacre Island at the second bluff is 
at Twenty-seven Mile Bluff. Near there Creoles still fondly point 
out the site of 'Vieux Fort,' and there French maps, as early as 
1744, place a 'vieux fort, detruit.' A well under a hickory tree still 
marks the spot, and bullets, canister, crockery, large-headed spike, 
and a brass ornament were picked up by the present writer near 
the river edge of the level bluff as late as the summer of 1897. 
There, then, on a wooded spot, twenty feet above the river, hardly 
deserving the name of bluff, save above ordinary high water, was 
Fort de la Louisiane, commanding the wide, turbid river. It was 
not one of the many Forts St. Louis. Like Louisiana, it was named 
from Louis XIV., rather than for the sainted Louis IX." (Hamil- 
ton, "Colonial Mobile," page 38.) 

In 1709 a great rise in the river occurred, which overflowed 
both the fort and the little town that had sprung up around it. 
A change of base was then decided upon, and "Fort de la Louis- 
iane" was built on the site of the present city of Mobile. In 
17 10 the old fort was abandoned. 



8 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 



Here, at the old and at the new Fort de la Louisiane, or 
rather on Dauphine Island, at the entrance of the harbor of 
Mobile, where the large vessels from Europe discharged their 
passengers and cargoes, around the Bay of Biloxi and on Ship 
Island (Isle aux Vaisseaux) in the Gulf of Mexico, the life 
of the colony of Louisiana centered for the next twenty years. 
Here the principal events took place, and here also landed the 
first Germans. 

On the accompanying map "Vieux Biloxi" means the old 
"Fort Maurepas," now Ocean Springs. Opposite is "Le Biloxi," 
the present Biloxi, Mississippi, or "New Biloxi," at first also 
called "Fort Louis." 




.Z.JO 



3 3 









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8 




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A Grave Error. 

In the beginning of the colony the French committed the 
grave error of not giving any attention to agriculture. Two 
years after the founding of Mobile, in 1704, the civilian part 
of the population of Louisiana consisted of only twenty-three 
families, with ten children, who lived along the shore in huts 
with palmetto or straw roofs, fishing and hunting. It is true 
that they also had little gardens around their huts, but for pro- 
visions they relied on the vessels from France. They pre- 
tended that nothing could be grown on the sandy soil of the 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 9 

gulf coast, and they complained not only of the soil, but of the 
water also. Says Dupratz (1,268) : 

"The soil and the water of Mobile are not only barren as 
regards the propagation of plants and fishes; the nature of the 
water and of the soil contributes also to the prevention of the in- 
crease of the animals; even the women have experienced this. I 
have it from Madam Hubert, the wife of the 'Commissionaire 
Ordonnateur,' that at the time when the French were at that post 
there were seven or eight sterile women who all became mothers 
from the time when they established themselves with their hus- 
bands on the banks of the Mississippi, whence the capital had been 
transferred." 

The water and the soil of the gulf coast have not changed, 
and there is no complaint as to the birth rate now; considerable 
truck farming is done in the neighborhood of Mobile and on 
the back bay of Biloxi, and the Indians in the territory com- 
plained of always raised corn, beans, -and many other things. 

The truth is that the first colonists did not want to work, 
and the governors of that period complained bitterly of that 
fact. The people expected to find gold, silver, and pearls as 
the Spaniards had done in Mexico.^ They also traded with 
Canadian "coureurs de bois," hunters who came down the Mis- 
sissippi, killing buffaloes, and selling hides and beaver skins. 
The French also expected to do a great deal of business with the 
Spaniards in Mexico. 

Since the expected mineral treasures of the gulf coast, how- 
ever, have not been discovered even to-day — since the Spaniards, 
who claimd the whole northern gulf coast for themselves, were 
unwilling to trade with the French — since the trade with the 
Indians and with the Canadian hunters was too insignificant, — 
since France, whose treasury had been emptied by Louis XIV, 
could not do much for the colony — and, to make the worst 
come to the worst, since yellow fever was introduced from San 
Domingo in 1701 ^ and again in 1704,^ the little colony of 



*The name "Pearl River", which now forms the boundary line between 
the States of Louisiana and Mississippi, is attributed to the fact that some 
inferior pearls were said to have been found in that river. 

* Sauvole, the first governor, died of fever in that year. 

'The Chevalier Tonti died in Mobile of yellow fever in 1704. 



10 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Louisiana was for many years in a precarious condition and 
at times on the very verge of ruin. 

Thus the colony continued until, in 1712, Crozat, a French 
merchant, took in hand its management as a commercial venture. 
He received the trade monopoly for fifteen years, but after the 
first five years he found himself compelled to ask the regent of 
France to rescind his contract, which request was granted. 

The "Western Company" and the "Compagnie des Indes'" — 

John Law. 

Then came, in 171 7, the "Western Company," called after 
1 719, "La Compagnie des Indes," the leading spirit of which 
was the notorious Scotch financier, John Law. This company 
received the trade monopoly for twenty-five years. It was 
granted the right to issue an unlimited number of shares of 
stock, and the privilege not only of giving away land on con- 
ditions, but also of selling it outright. For these and other 
considerations the company obligated itself to bring into the 
colony during the life of its franchise at least 6000 white people 
and 3000 negroes. 

The shares of the company were "guaranteed" by its assets. 
These were : first, the supposedly inexhaustible mineral treas- 
ures of Louisiana; secondly, the fabulous wealth of its soil, 
which was at that time not known at all, as "nothing could be 
grown on the sandy soil of the gulf coast," the only part then 
inhabited ; and, thirdly, the immense revenues to be derived from 
the trade monopoly. In order to develop all these sources of 
wealth to their fullest capacity, agriculture was now also to 
be introduced on a grand scale. For this purpose large tracts 
of land, concessions, were now given to such rich men in France 
as would obligate themselves to bring the necessary number of 
people from Europe to till the soil. 

One of the largest concessioners was John Law, the presi- 
dent of the company, who caused two concessions to be given 
to himself. The larger one was on the lower Arkansas River, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana ii 

on which he obligated himself to settle many people, for whose 
protection against the Indians he promised to keep a company 
of dragoons. His second concession was seven lieues below New 
Orleans, on the Mississippi River, below English Turn, and ad- 
joining one of the concessions to the minister of war, Le Blanc, 
whose principal possessions were on the Yazoo River. 

As a shrewd business man, which he no doubt was, John 
Law knew that, to make his venture a success, he needed not 
only capital but also people able and willing to toil for him; 
and, as he knew from the reports of the former governors how 
little adapted to agriculture the former French colonists had 
proven themselves, he resolved to engage for his own conces- 
sions Germans from the country on both sides of the river 
Rhine, and from Switzerland. 

A great agitation was now begun, partly to induce rich 
people to take shares in the general enterprise and buy land for 
their own account, and partly to entice poor people to become 
engages (hired field hands for the company or for the different 
concessioners). After a while, land was also to be given to the 
poor engages to enable them also to get rich. 

A German Description of Louisiana in the Year 1720. 

About this time, pamphlets in several languages were printed, 
containing extracts from letters of people who had already set- 
tled in Louisiana, and giving glowing descriptions of the country. 
Such a pamphlet, in German, which, perhaps, came to Louisiana 
with one of the German pioneer families, was found , by the 
author some twenty-five years ago in a little book shop in Ex- 
change Alley, New Orleans, and at his suggestion it was bought 
for the Fisk Library, where it can be seen. It was printed by 
J. Friedrich Gleditschen's seel. Sohn, Leipsic, 1720, and bears 
the title: 




12 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

£)e^ an bm grojlett ^^uflfc 

MISSISSIPI 

In 9]orb*3(merica gelegcnen Jenfic^en ianftetf 

LOUISIANA: 

McttcU'Aufgcrld^rerc 8ran^6jifc^c groffc 

Solonien ju fcf)icfen ansefangen ; 
einigeOtejleponcn uber Me ttjeit^^jjinauc^' 

fc^en^c Def^eins9c^ac^te^; Sompagnic, 

Unt) 

tc0 baruBcr enff^anbcrtert 

crDffttct wer^en. 
2(ttbet'e 2liufla^c, 

Mt neuen25et)Iagert unt) SitimcrcftUigm 

\)etmet)tct. 

I 7 2 G, 

After stating that "through the adventurer 'Christophum 
Columbum' many of those Europeans had been led to leave 
'Europam' for 'Americam,' especially for those then still un- 
discovered countries," the author describes the boundaries of 
Louisiana as follows : 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 13 

''The boundaries of Louisiana are towards east Florida and 
Carolina, towards north Virginia and Canada. The northern Hm- 
its are entirely unknown. In 1700, a Canadian, M. le Sieur, as- 
cended the Mississippi over 700 miles. But there is still another 
district known of over 100 miles, for which reason it is almost to 
be supposed that this country extends to the 'Polum Arcticum.'" 

The soil, the author says, is "extremely pleasant." Four 
crops a year can be raised. The abundance of the country can- 
not be easily imagined. There is also game, which every person 
is permitted to kill : leopards, bears, buffaloes, deer, whole swarms 
of Indian hens, snipe, turtle-doves, partridges, wood-pigeons, 
quail, beavers, martens, wild cats, parrots, buzzards, and ducks. 
Deer is the most useful game, and the French carry on a great 
"negotium" in doeskins, which they purchase from the savages. 
Ten to twelve leaden bullets are given in exchange for such a 
skin. 

The principal things, however, are the mines : 

"The land is filled with gold, silver, copper, and lead mines. 
If one wishes to hunt for mines, he need only go into the country 
of the Natchitoches. There we will surely 'draw pieces of silver 
mines out of the earth.' After these mines we will hunt for herbs 
and plants for the apothecaries. The savages will make them 
known to us. Soon we shall find healing remedies for the most 
dangerous wounds, yes, also, so they say, infallible ones for the 
fruits of love." 

Of the spring floods in "Februario and Martio" the author 
says that they are sometimes so high that the water rises over 
100 feet, so that the tops of the pine trees on the seashore can 
no longer be seen. 

About New Orleans a man writes to his wife in Europe : 

"I betook myself to where they are beginning now to build the 
capital, New Orleans. Its circumference will be one mile. The 
houses are poor and low, as at home with us in the country. They 
are covered with large pieces of bark and strong reeds. Every- 
body dresses as he pleases, but all very poorly. One's outfit con- 
sists of a suit of clothes, bed, table, and trunks. Tapestry and 
fine beds are entirely unknown. The people sleep the whole night 
in the open air. I am as safe in the most distant part of the town 
as in a citadel. Although I live among savages and Frenchmen, 
I am in no danger. People trust one another so much that they 
leave gates and doors open." 



14 The Settlement of the Gennan Coast of Louisiana 

The productiveness of the investment in land, and the value 
of the shares are thus made clear to the people : 

"If one gets 300 acres of land for 100 Reichstalers, then three 
acres cost one Taler; but, if the benefit to be derived and other 
'prerogatives' of such lands are considered then an acre of this 
land, even if not cultivated, is worth about 100 Talers. From this 
basis it follows that 300 acres, which, as stated already, cost 100 
Talers when purchased, are really worth 30,000 Talers. For this 
reason one can easily understand why these shares may yet rise 
very high." 

No wonder that the agitation on both banks of the river 
Rhine, from Switzerland to Holland, bore fruit, and that thou- 
sands of people got themselves ready to emigrate to Louisiana. 



Ten Thousand Germans on the Way to Louisiana. 

German historians state that, as a result of this agitation, 
10,000 Germans emigrated to Louisiana. This seems a rather 
large number of people to be enticed by the promoter's promises 
to leave their fatherland and emigrate to a distant country; but 
we must consider the pitiable condition under which these people 
lived at home. No part of Germany had suffered more through 
the terrible "Thirty Years' War" (1618-1648), than the country 
on the Rhine, and especially the Palatinate; and after the Thirty 
Years' War came the terrible period of Louis XIV., during which 
large portions of Alsace and Lorraine, with the city of Strass- 
burg, were forcibly and against the protestations of the people 
taken away from the German empire, and the Palatinate partic- 
ularly was devastated in the most terrible manner. Never before 
nor afterwards were such barbarous deeds perpetrated as by 
Turenne, Melac, and other French generals in the Palatinate; 
and whether French troops invaded Germany or Germans 
marched against the French, it was always the Palatinate and 
the other countries on both banks of the Rhine that suffered most 
through war and its fearful consequences; pestilence, famine, 
and often also religious persecution, — for the ruler of a country 
then often prescribed which religion his subjects must follow. 

These people on the Rhine had at last lost courage, and, as 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 15 

in 1709/10, at the time of the great famine, 15,000 inhabitants 
of the Palatinate had Hstened to the EngHsh agents and had 
gone down the Rhine to England to seek passage for the English 
colonies in America, so they were again only too eager to listen 
to the Louisiana promoter, promising them peace, political and 
religious freedom, and wealth in the new world. So they went 
forth, not only from the Palatinate, but also from Alsace, Lor- 
raine, Baden, Wiirtemberg, the electorates of Mayence and 
Treves (Mainz and Trier), and even from Switzerland, some 
of whose sons were already serving in the Swiss regiments of 
Halwyl and Karer, sent by France to Louisiana. 

The statement that 10,000 Germans left their homes for 
Louisiana is also supported by unimpeachable French testimony. 
The Jesuit Charlevoix, who came from Canada to Louisiana in 
December, 1721, and passed "the mournful wrecks" of the set- 
tlement on John Law's grant on the Arkansas River, mentions 
in his letter "these 9,000 Germans, who were raised in the 
Palatinate." 

How Many of These 10,000 Germans Reached Louisiana? 

Only a small portion of these 10,000 Germans ever reached 
the shores of Louisiana. We read that the roads leading to the 
French ports of embarkation were covered with Germans, but 
that many broke down on their journey from hardships and 
privations. In the French ports, moreover, where no prepara- 
tions had been made for the care of so many strangers, and 
where, while waiting for the departure of the vessels, the emi- 
grants lay crowded together for months, and were insufficiently 
fed, epidemic diseases broke out among them and carried off 
many. Indeed, the church registers of Louisiana contain proofs 
of this fact. In the old marriage records, which always give 
the names of the parents of the contracting parties, the writer 
has often found the remark that the parents of the bride or of 
the bridegroom had died in the French ports of L'Orient, La 
Rochelle, or Brest. Others tired of waiting in port, and, perhaps, 



l6 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

becoming discouraged, gave up the plan of emigrating to Louis- 
iana, looked for work in France, and remained there. 

Then came the great loss of human life on the voyage across 
the sea. Such a voyage often lasted several months, long stops 
often being made in San Domingo, where the people were ex- 
posed to infection from tropical diseases. When even strong 
and healthy people succumbed to diseases brought on by the pri- 
vations and hardships of such a voyage, by the miserable fare, 
by the lack of drinking water and disinfectants, and by the ter- 
rible odors in the ship's hold, — how must these emigrants have 
fared, weakened as they were from their journey through France 
and from sickness in the French ports? At one time only forty 
Germans landed in Louisiana of 200 who had gone on board. 
Martin speaks of 200 Germans who landed out of 1200. 

Sickness and starvation, however, were not the only dan- 
gers of the emigrant of those days. At that time the buccaneers, 
who had been driven from Yucatan by the Spaniards in 171 7, 
were yet in the Gulf of Mexico, and pursued European vessels 
because these, in addition to emigrants, usually carried large 
quantities of provisions, arms, ammunition, and money; and 
many a vessel that plied between France and Louisiana was 
never heard of again. In 1721 a French ship with "300 very 
sick Germans" on board was captured by buccaneers near the 
Bay of Samana in San Domingo. 

After considering all this we are ready to approach the 
question of how many Germans really left France for Louisiana. 
Chevalier Guy Soniat DufTosat, a French naval officer who settled 
in Louisiana about 1751, in his "Synopsis of the History of 
Louisiana" (page 15) says, that 6000 Germans left Europe for 
Louisiana. This statement, if not correct, comes evidently so near 
to the truth that we may accept it. 

To ^his it may be added that according to my own searching 
inquiries, and after the examination of all the well-known author- 
ities, as well as of copies of many official documents until recently 
unavailable, I have come to the conclusion that of those 6000 Ger- 
mans who left Europe for Louisiana, only about one-third — 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 17 

2000 — actually reached the shores of the colony. By this I do 
not mean to say that 2000 Germans settled in Louisiana, but 
only that 2000 reached the shores and were disembarked in 
Biloxi and upon Dauphine Island, in the harbor of Mobile. How 
many of them perished in those two places will be told in another 
part of this work. 



French Colonists. 

Besides John Law, who enlisted Germans, the Western 
Company and the other concessioners also carried on an agita- 
tion for the enlistment of engages. How this was done, and 
what results were obtained with the French colonists, is de- 
scribed by the Jesuit Charlevoix, an eye witness, who came to 
Louisiana in 1721 to report on the condition of the colony. He 
says : 

"The people who are sent there are miserable wretches driven 
from France for real or supposed crimes, or bad conduct, or per- 
sons who have enlisted in the troops or enrolled as emigrants, in 
order to avoid the pursuit of their creditors. Both classes regard 
the country as a place of exile. Everything disheartens them; 
nothing interests them in the progress of a colony of which they 
are only members in spite of themselves." (Marbois, page 115.) 

The Chevalier Champigny in his Memoire (La Haye, 1776) 
expresses himself stronger: 

"They gathered up the poor, mendicants and prostitutes, and 
embarked them by force on the transports. On arriving in Louisi- 
ana they were married and had lands assigned to them to cultivate, 
but the idle life of three-fourths of these folks rendered them 
unfit for farming. You cannot find twenty of these vagabond fami- 
lies in Louisiana now. Most of them died in misery or returned 
to France, bringing back such ideas which their ill success had 
inspired. The most frightful accounts of the country of the Miss- 
issippi soon began to spread among the public, at a time when Ger- 
man colonists were planting new and most successful establish- 
ments on the banks of the Mississippi, within five or seven leagues 
from New Orleans. This tract, still occupied by their descendants, 
is the best cultivated and most thickly settled part of the colony, 
and I regard the Germans and the Canadians as the founders of 
all our establishments in Louisiana." 



l8 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Franz, in his "Kolonisation des Mississippitales" (Leipzig, 
1906), writes: 

"The company even kept a whole regiment of archers (band- 
ouillers de Mississippi) which cleaned Paris of its rabble and adven- 
turers, and received for this a fixed salary and 100 livres a head, 
and even honest people were not safe from them. Five thousand 
people are said to have disappeared from Paris in April, 1721, 
alone." (Page 124.) 

And again : 

"Prisoners were set free in Paris in September, 1719, and 
later, under the condition that they would marry prostitutes and 
go with them to Louisiana. The newly married couples were 
chained together and thus dragged to the port of embarkation." 
(Page 121.) 

The complaints of the concessioners and of the company 
itself concerning this class of French immigrants and engages 
were soon so frequent and so pressing, that the French govern- 
ment, in May, 1720, prohibited such deportations. This, how- 
ever, did not prevent the shipping of a third lot of lewd women 
in 1 72 1, the first and the second having been sent in 1719 and 
1720. 

Arrival of the First Immigration en Masse. 

The first immigration en masse took place in the year 17 18. 
There landed then in Louisiana, which at that time had only 
700 inhabitants, on one day 800 persons, so that the population 
on that one day was more than doubled. 

How many Germans were among these I cannot say ; but, as 
several concessions are mentioned to which some of these immi- 
grants were sent, and as the church registers of Louisiana men- 
tion names of Germans who served on these concessions, we 
may assume that there were some Germans among them. 

In the spring and summer of 1719 immigration to Louis- 
iana was suspended on account of the war which had broken 
out between France and Spain. The Louisiana troops took 
Pensacola from Spain, lost it again, and retook it. In front 
of Dauphine Island, in the harbor of Mobile, where there were 
some concessioners with their engages, a Spanish flotilla ap- 
peared, shutting off the island for ten days. The crew of a 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 19 

Spanish gunboat plundered the property of the concessioners 
lying on the shore, but were repulsed in a second attempt by 
the French solders, some Indians, and the people engaged by 
the concessioners. 

In the fall of 1719 the French ship "Les Deux Freres" 
came to Ship Island with "a great number of Germans." The 
ship was laden with all sorts of merchandise and effects "which 
belonged to them." These people could not have been intended 
for John Law ; for, judging from what they brought along with 
them, they must have been people of some means, who intended 
to become independent settlers. 

A Misstatement. 

This report is taken from "Relation Penicaut." Penicaut 
was a French carpenter who lived for twenty-two years (1699 
to October, 1721) in the colony, and his "Relation" is an im- 
portant source for the history of Louisiana. Mr. French, whose 
"Historical Collection of Louisiana" is well known, translated 
it and published it in the first volume of his "Louisiana and 
Florida." In this translation (N. Y., 1889, I., 151) we read 
concerning the German immigrants of the ship "Les Deux 
Freres," mentioned before, the following: 

"This was the first installment of twelve thousand Germans 
purchased by the Western Company from one of the princes of 
Germany to colonize Louisiana." 

This is not true. For in the first place, the original text of 
"Relation Penicaut" which Margry printed in his volume V. 
does not contain a single word about an installment nor about 
a German prince who had sold his subjects to the Western Com- 
pany; and secondly, people who come "with all sorts of mer- 
chandise and effects, which belong to them," are not people who 
have been sold. 

In November, 17 19, when the headquarters of the company 
were no longer on Dauphine Island, in the harbor of Mobile,* 
but had been again transferred to Fort Maurepas (Ocean 

*A sand bar formed by a storm in 1717 having ruined the entrance to 
that harbor. 



20 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Springs), a part of this fort was burned,^ whereupon the woods 
on the other side of the Biloxi Bay were cut down, and Dumont 
reports that "a company of stout German soldiers" were busy 
at that work. Whence these German soldiers came we are in- 
formed by the "Memoire pour Duverge" (Margry V., 6i6), 
where it is stated that a company of 210 Swiss "soldats ouv- 
riers" had been sent to the colony. They cleared the land at the 
site of the present Biloxi, built a fort, houses, and barracks for 
officers and soldiers, magazines, and "even a cistern." This 
place was called "New Biloxi," and thither the Compagnie des 
Indes, on the 20th of December, 1720, decided to transfer its 
headquarters. Governor Bienville also took up his residence 
there on the 9th of September, 1721, but transferred it to New 
Orleans in the month of August, 1722. 

From this time until the beginning of the Spanish period, 
in 1768, the Swiss formed an integral part of the French troops 
in Louisiana. There were always at least four companies of 
fifty men each in the colony. They regularly received new addi- 
tions, and, at the expiration of their time of service, they usually 
took up a trade, or settled on some land contiguous to the Ger- 
man coast. It was even a rule to give annually land, provisions, 
and rations to two men from each Swiss company to facilitate 
their settling. 

According to the church records of Louisiana (marriage 
and death registers), the great majority of these Swiss soldiers 
were Germans from all parts of the fatherland under Swiss or 
Alsatian officers. Of the latter, Philip Grondel, of Zabern, be- 
came celebrated as the greatest fighter and most feared duellist 
of the whole colony. He was made chevalier of the military 
order of St. Louis, and commander of the Halwyl regiment of 
Swiss soldiers. 

As to the general reputation these Swiss-German soldiers 
established for themselves in Louisiana, it is interesting to read 

that 

"Governor Kerlerec even begged that Swiss troops be sent to 
him in place of the French, not only on account of their superior 

' A drunken sergeant dropping his lighted pipe had set fire to it. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 21 

discipline and fighting qualities, but because the colonists had as 
great a dread of the violence, cruelty, and debauchery of the troops 
ordinarily sent out from France as they had of the savages." 
(Albert Phelps' "Louisiana," page 95.) 

In the beginning of the year 1720, says Penicaut, seven 
ships came with more than 4000 persons, "French as w^ell as 
Germans and Jews." They were the ships "La Gironde," 
"L'Elephant," "La Loire," "La Seine," "Le Dromadaire," "La 
Traversier," and "La Venus." As "Le Dromadaire" brought the 
whole outfit for John Law's concession, the staff of Mr. Elias,^ 
the Jewish business manager of Law, may have been on board 
this vessel. For the same reason we may assume that the German 
people on board, or at least a large part of them, were so-called 
"Law People." 

On the i6th of September, 1720, the ship "Le Profond" 
brought more than 240 Germans "for the concession of Mr. 
Law," '^ and on the 9th of November, 1720, the ship "La Marie" 
brought Mr. Levens, the second director of Law's concessions, 
and Mr. Maynard, "conducteur d'ouvriers." 

The Germans who came on the seven ships mentioned by 
Penicaut and those who arrived on board the "Le Profond" seem 
to have been the only ones of the thousands recruited for Law 
in Germany who actually reached the Arkansas River, travel- 
ing from Biloxi by way of the inland route — Lake Borgne, Lake 
Pontchartrain, Lake Maurepas, Amite River, Bayou Manchac 
and the Mississippi River. 

How THE Immigrants Were Received and Provided for. 
A Terrible State of Affairs. 

A rapid increase of the population, especially a doubling 
of it on one day, would at all times, even in a well regulated 
community, be a source of embarrassment; and it would need 
the most careful preparations and the purchasing and storing 
of a great quantity of provisions in order to solve the problem 
of subsistence in a satisfactory manner. 

*Terrage calls him "Elias Stultheus". 
*La Harpe. 



22 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

On Daiipliine Island and on Biloxi Bay, nevertheless, where 
the officials of the Compagnie des Indes ruled, nothing was done 
for the reception of so many newcomers. Everybody seems to 
have lived there like unto the lilies of the field: "They toiled 
not, neither did they spin." Nobody sowed, nobody harvested, 
and all waited for the provision ships from France and from 
San Domingo, which often enough did not arrive when needed 
most, so that the soldiers had to be sent out to the Indians in 
the woods to make a living there as best they could by fishing 
and hunting. Penicaut says that the Indians, especially the 
Indian maidens, enjoyed these visits of the soldiers as much as 
the French did. This statement seems to be confirmed by the 
baptismal records of Mobile, where the writer found entries 
saying that Indian women "in the pains of childbirth" gave the 
names of the officers and soldiers whom they claimed as the 
fathers of their children. There are prominent names among 
these fathers. 

Thus the poor immigrants were put on land where there 
was always more or less of famine, sometimes even of starva- 
tion, and where the provisions which the concessioners had 
brought with them to feed their own engages were taken away 
from the ships by force to feed the soldiers, and the immigrants 
were told to subsist on what they might be able to catch on the 
beach, standing for the most part of the day in the salt water 
up to the waist — crabs, oysters, and the like — and on the corn 
which the Biloxi, the Pascagoula, the Chacta, and the Mobile 
Indians might let them have. 

Governor Bienville repeatedly demanded that these immi- 
grants should not be landed on the gulf coast at all, but should 
be taken up the Mississippi River to the place where he intended 
to esablish his headquarters and build the city of New Orleans; 
because thence they could easily reach the concessions, a major- 
ity of which were on the banks of the Mississippi. But the 
question whether large vessels could enter and ascend the great 
river — the French directors pretended not to know this yet, 
although the colony had been in existence for about twenty 
years — and the little and the big quarrels between the directors 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 23 

and the governor, whom they would never admit to be right, did 
not permit this rational solution of the difficulty. 

Furthermore, as a very large number of smaller boats, by 
which the immigrants might easily have been taken to the con- 
cessions by the inland route through Lake Pontchartrain, had 
been allowed to go to wreck on the sands of Biloxi, the new- 
comers, especially those who arrived in 1721, had to stay for 
many months in Biloxi and on Dauphine Island, where they 
starved in masses or died of epidemic diseases. 

It may be taken for granted that at these two places more 
than one thousand Germans died. 

"Many died," says Dumond, "because in their hunger they ate 
plants which they did not know and which instead of giving them 
strength and nourishment, gave them death, and most of those 
who were found dead among the piles of oyster shells were Ger- 
mans." 

In the spring of 1721 such a fearful epidemic raged in 
Biloxi among the immigrants that the priests at that place, having 
so many other functions to perform, were no longer able to 
keep the death register. (See "Etat Civil" for 1727, where a 
Capuchin priest records the death of a victim of the epidemic of 
1 72 1, in Biloxi, on the strength of testimony of witnesses, no 
other way of certifying to the death being possible.) 

Thus, for many months, the effects of the concessioners and 
of the immigrants were exposed to the elements on the sand of 
the beach. Even the equipment for Law's concession, which 
had arrived in the beginning of 1720, a cargo valued at a million 
of livres, lay in the open air in Biloxi for fifteen months, before 
the ship "Le Dromadaire," in May, 1721, at the order of the 
governor, but against the protests of some of the directors of 
the company, sailed with it for the mouth of the Mississippi. 

This ship, with its load, drew thirteen feet of water and, 
as the "Neptune," also drawing thirteen feet, had crossed the 
bar of the Mississippi and sailed up to the site of New Orleans 
as early as 1718, and as an English vessel carrying 16 guns had 
passed up to English Turn in September, 1699, there was no 
reason whatsoever for detaining "Le Dromadaire" for fifteen 



24 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

months. A proper use of the "Neptune" alone, which had been 
stationed permanently in the colony since 1718, would have re- 
lieved the congestion in Biloxi and saved thousands of human 
lives which were sacrificed by the criminal neglect of the officials 
of the Compagnie des Indes. 

As "Le Dromadaire" carried the oufit for the Law conces- 
sion and for the plantation of St. Catharine, this ship may also 
have had some passengers on board, German engages, so-called 
Law people; but perhaps not very many, as Bienville, in sending 
her to the Mississippi against the protests of some of the directors 
of the company, took a great responsibility upon himself, and 
could not afford to load her too heavily, lest there should be 
trouble in getting her over the bar of the river. The larger 
number of the German Law people, those who had arrived during 
the year 1720, had, no doubt, been sent to the Arkansas River 
by the inland route to clear the land and provide shelter for 
the great number of Germans who were expected to arrive in 
the spring of 1721. 

No wonder that under such conditions as obtained in Biloxi 
a very low state of law and order reigned there, and that com- 
plete anarchy could be prevented only by drastic measures. A 
company of Swiss soldiers in the absence of their commander 
forced the captain of a ship to turn his vessel and to take them 
to Havana; and another company marched off to join the English 
in Carolina. The Swiss in Fort Toulouse, above Mobile, also 
rose and killed their captain; but these mutineers were captured 
and punished in Indian fashion by crushing their heads; one 
Swiss was packed into a barrel which was then sawed in two, 
and a German who had helped himself to something to eat in 
the warehouse in Biloxi was condemned by the Superior Council 
to be pulled five times through the water under the keel of a 
vessel. 

But punishment which was meted out so severely to the 
small pilferer did not reach the guilty ones in high positions. 
Though the Germans on the other side of the bay died by the 
hundreds from starvation, Hubert, the commissioner general, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 25 

who, as an investigation proved, had not kept any books during 
the whole tenure of his office, did not even know that there was 
a shipload of provisions in the hull of a vessel stranded near 
Ocean Springs and left there for eleven months. Yet Hubert 
was not punished. 

Even this description, perhaps, does not give the whole 
truth, as contemporary writers did not dare to say what they 
knew. Dupratz says (I. 166) : 

"So delicate a matter is it to give utterance to the truth that 
the pen often falls from the hands of those who are most disposed 
to be accurate." 

Germans in Pascagoula. 

In January, 1721, 300 engages came to the concession of 
Madame Chaumont in Pascagoula. There were no Germans 
among them, as the census of 1725 shows, but Pensacola must 
be mentioned here, as there was a German colony at that place 
very early, arising, perhaps, on the ruins of this concession or 
of some other enterprise. The date of the founding of that 
German settlement is not known; but, in 1772, the English 
captain Ross found there, on the farm of "Krebs," cotton grow- 
ing and a roller cotton gin, the invention of Krebs, and, perhaps, 
the first successful cotton gin in America.^ 

In the same year (1772) we hear of a great storm which 
raged most furiously "on the farm of Krebs and among the 
Germans of Pascagoula." 

His last will and testament, written in New Orleans in the 
Spanish language in 1776, gives his full name as "Hugo Ernestus 
Krebs." He was from Neumagen on the Moselle, Germany, and 
left fourteen grown children, whose descendants still own the 
old Krebs farm, which the author visited in August, 1906. It 
is situated on a slight elevation on the border of "Krebs' Lake," 
near the mouth of the Pascagoula River, and a mile and a half 
north of the railroad station of Scranton (now incorporated with 
East Pascagoula), Mississippi. 

• Cotton was planted in Louisiana much earlier. Charlevoix saw some 
in a garden in Natchez in 1721; and Dupratz constructed a machine for 
extracting the seed; but his machine was a failure. 



26 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

The Creoles there call the Krebs home "the old fort," and 
the three front rooms forming the center of the house, the rest 
consisting of more recent additions, were evidently built with a 
view of affording protection against the Indians. The walls of 
this part of the house are eighteen inches thick, the masonry 
consists of a very hard concrete of lime, unbroken large oyster 
shells, and clay. The post and sills are of heavy cypress, which, 
after serving at least 175 years, do not show any signs of 
decay. The floor is made of concrete similar to that of the 
walls, but a wooden floor has been laid upon it, taking away 
about eighteen inches from the original height of the rooms. 
All the wood work was hewn with the broad axe. 

In front of the house lies an old mill stone which once 
upon a time served to crush the corn. 

Near the house is the "Krebs Cemetery," with the tombs 
of the members of the Krebs family, of whom a great number 
are buried there. The accompanying pictures were taken on the 
spot. 

According to the family traditions the old fort was built by 
"Commodore de la Pointe," who is said to have been a brother 
of Madame Chaumont. Hamilton, in his "Colonial Mobile," 
page 140, says that Joseph Simon de la Pointe received, on the 
I2th of November, 171 5, from Governor Cadillac, a land con- 
cession on Dauphine Island for the purpose of enabling him to 
raise cattle. As Dauphine Island was practically abandoned, after 
the great storm of 171 7, de la Pointe probably also gave up his 
concession, and a map, drawn about 1732 ("Colonial Mobile," 
page 86) shows "Habitation du Sieur Lapointe" ^) on the very 
spot where the Krebs homestead now stands, near the mouth 
of the Pascagoula River. 

La Pointe's daughter, Marie Simon de la Pointe, became 
the first wife of Hugo Ernestus Krebs. Thus the old fort came 
into possession of the Krebs family, where it still remains, the 
present owner and occupant being Mrs. J. T. Johnson, nee 
Cecile Krebs, an amiable and highly intelligent lady to whom 



* Every concessioner was given the title of "Sieur 




THE KREBS HOMESTEAD (tIIE OLD FORt). 




KREBS CEMETERY. 




KREBS CEMETERY. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 27 

the author's thanks are due. She is the great grand-daughter 
of Joseph Simon Krebs, the eldest son of Hugo Ernestus Krebs 
and Marie Simon de la Pointe. 

Francesco Krebs, the second son of Hugo Ernestus Krebs 
and Marie Simon de la Pointe, received Round Island in the 
Bay of Pascagoula, containing about no acres of land, as a 
grant from the Spanish government, on the 13th of December, 
1783, after having occupied it for many years. The family of 
his wife had received permission to settle there from the French 
governor Bienville, who left Louisiana in May, 1743. 

Pest Ships. 

On the 3d of February, 1721, the ship "La Mutine" ar- 
rived at Ship Island with 147 Swiss "Ouvriers" of the Compagnie 
des Indes, under the command of Sieur de Merveilleux and his 
brother. French speaks of 347 Swiss. 

Shortly before, on the 24th of January, 1721, four ships 
had sailed from the French port of L'Orient for Louisiana with 
875 Germans and 66 Swiss emigrants. The names of these ships 
were "Les Deux Freres," "La Garonne," "La Saonne," and 
"La Charante." Of these four ships the official passenger lists, 
signed by the authorities of L'Orient, have been preserved, and 
a copy of the same came into the possession of the "Louisiana 
Historical Society" in December, 1904. From these it appears 
that these emigrants, who had, perhaps, traveled in troops from 
their homes in Germany and Switzerland to the port of embarka- 
tion, were divided on board according to the parishes whence 
they had come. Each parish had a "prevot" or "maire," whilst 
the leader of the Swiss bears the title of "brigadier." We find 
the parishes of 

Hoffen (there is one Hofen in Alsace, one in Hesse-Nassan, 
three in Wurtemberg, also five "Hoefen" in Germany) ; 

Freiburg (Baden) ; 

Augsburg (Bavaria) ; 

Friedrichsort (near Kiel, Holstein) ; 

Freudenfeld (some small place in Germany not contained even 
in Neumann's "Orts-und Verkehrs-Lexicon," which gives 
the names of all places of 300 inhabitants and upwards) ; 



28 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Neukirchen (many places of that name in Germany, but this 
seems to have been Neukirchen, electorate of Mayence) ; 

Sinzheim (one Sinzheim and one Sinsheim, both in Baden) ; 

Freudenburg (Treves [Trier], Rhenish Prussia); 

Brettheim (Wurtemberg) ; 

Wertheim (on the Tauber, Germany) ; 

Sinken (one Singen near Durlach, another near Constance, 
both in Baden, Germany) ; 

Ingelheim (near Mayence, Prussia) ; 

Hochburg (Baden). 

It w^ould seem strange that, in spite of the great number of 
people whom these four vessels had on board for Louisiana, not 
one of our Louisiana historians should mention by name the 
arrival in the colony of more than one of these ships. There is 
a horrible cause for this : but few of these Q41 emigrants survived 
the horrors of the sea voyage and landed on the coast of Louis- 
iana! 

The one ship mentioned as having arrived is "Les Deux 
Freres," v^hich La Harpe reports as having reached Louisiana 
on the I St of March, 1721, with only 40 Germans for John 
Law out of 200 who had gone on board in France. The official 
passenger list before me mentions 147 Germans and 66 Swiss, or 
213 persons on board. Therefore i/j lives out of 21^ were 
lost on this ship alone on the sea! 

And the other three vessels? Martin says that in March, 
1 72 1, only 200 Germans arrived in Louisiana out of 1200 em- 
barked in France. Martin, no doubt, refers to the 875 Germans 
and 66 Swiss on board the four ships just mentioned, with, per- 
haps, one or two additional ships. 

"La Garonne" was the ship with the 300 "very sick" Ger- 
mans which was taken by the pirates near San Domingo. 

What suffering must have been endured on board these pest 
ships, what despair! Fearful sickness must have raged with 
indescribable fury. 

The history of European emigration to America does not 
record another death rate approaching this. The one coming 
nearest to it is that of the "Emanuel," "Juffer Johanna," and 
"Johanna Maria," three Dutch vessels which sailed from Helder, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 29 

the deep water harbor of Amsterdam, in 18 17, with 11 50 Ger- 
mans destined for New Orleans. They arrived at the mouth 
of the Mississippi, after a voyage of five months, with only 597 
passengers living, the other 503 having died on the sea from 
starvation and sickness, many also in their fever and utter despair 
having jumped overboard.^*^ 

There is a document attached to the passenger lists of the 
four pest ships from L'Orient, giving the names of sixteen Ger- 
mans who were put ashore by the ship "La Garonne" in the port 
of Brest, France, a few days after her departure from L'Orient, 
and left at Brest at the expense of the company "chez le Sieur 
Morel as sick until their recovery or death." All sixteen died 
between the loth and the 27th of February, 1721, proving the 
deadly character of their malady. This disease having broken 
out immediately after the departure of "La Garonne" from 
L'Orient, and evidently on all four vessels, we may assume that 
the passengers were already infected while still in port, and it 
must have broken out a second time on board "La Garonne" 
after her departure from Brest. The heartless treatment given 
the emigrants of that time, the lack of wholesome food, drinking 
water, medicines and disinfectants accounts for the rest. 

Among the sixteen victims "chez le Sieur Morel" in Brest 
are found members of two families well known and very numer- 
ous in Louisiana at present : 

Jacob Scheckschneider (Cheznaidre) whose parents, Hans Rein- 
hard and Cath. Scheckschneider, were on board La Garonne 
with two children ; ^^ 

Hans Peter Schaf, whose parents, Hans Peter and Marie Lis- 
beth Schaf, were on board the same vessel with two chil- 
dren. The whole family seems to have perished, but there 
was a second family of that same name on board which 
will be mentioned presently. 

Of other passengers of La Garonne on this terrible 
voyage should be mentioned : 



" See the author's Das Redemptions system im Staafe Louisiana, p. 14. 
"The surviving child, Albert Scheckschneider, became the progenitor of 
the Scheckschneider family in Louisiana. 



30 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Ernst Katzenherger and wife, founders of the Casbergue fam- 

Adam Trischl, wife and three children, founders of the Triche 

family ; 
Andreas Traeger, wife and child, founders of the Tregre fam- 

ily; 
Jean Martin Traeger and wife, who seem to have perished; 
Joseph Keller, wife and two children, founders of the Keller 

family ; 
Jacob Schaf, his wife and six children (probably related to the 

Schaf family mentioned above), the founders of the Chauffe 

family. 

On the passenger list of the other three pest ships are found : 

Heidel (Haydel) Ship La Charante. Widow Jean Adam 
Heidel and two children. They were two sons, the elder 
of whom, "Ambros Heidel," married a daughter of Jacob 
Schaf (Chauffe) and became the progenitor of all the 
"Haydel" families in Louisiana. His younger brother is 
not mentioned after 1727. 

Zweig (Labranche) Ship Les Deux Freres. Two families: 
i) Jean Adam Zweig, wife and daughter; 
2) Jean Zweig, wife and two children, a son and a daugh- 
ter. The daughter married Jos. Verret, to whom she bore 
seven sons, and later she married Alexandre Baure. The 
son married Suzanna Marchand and became the progeni- 
tor of all the Labranche families. "Labranche" is a trans- 
lation of the German "Zweig" and appears in the marriage 
record of the son of Jean Zweig. 

Rommel (Rome) Ship Les Deux Freres. Jean Rommel, wife 
and two children, 

Hofmann (Ocman) Ship Les Deux Freres. Jean Hofmann, 
wife and child. Ship La Saone. Michael Hofmann, wife 
and two children from Augsburg, Bavaria. 

S chant z (Chance) Ship Les Deux Freres. Andreas Schantz 
and wife. 

These vessels having arrived in Biloxi during March, 1721, 
the 200 survivors of the 1200 Germans no doubt were in Biloxi 
in the following month, when the greatest of all epidemics raged 
there, and, after their escape from the dangers of the sea voyage, 
they again furnished material for disease. Jean Adam Zweig 
is especially mentioned in the census of 1724 as having died in 
Biloxi. 

Towards the end of May, 1721, the "St. Andre," which 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 31 

sailed April 13th, 1721, from L'Orient with 161 Germans, ar- 
rived in Louisiana. Among them are named Jean George 
Huber (Oubre, Ouvre), wife and child. A few days later, the 
"La Durance," which sailed April 23d, from L'Orient with 109 
Germans, reached Louisiana. On the passenger list of this ship 
appears "Caspar Dubs, wife and two children." Caspar Dubs 
was the progenitor of all the "Toups" families in Louisiana. He 
was from the neighborhood of Ziirich, Switzerland, where the 
"Dubs" family still has many branches in the Affoltern district. 

Finally there came, according to la Harpe, on the 4th of 
June, 1 72 1, the "Portefaix" from France with 330 immigrants, 
mostly Germans, and originally intended for John Law's con- 
cessions. They were under the command of Karl Friedrich 
D'Arensbourg, a former Swedish officer, then in the service of 
the Compagnie des Indes. La Harpe says that thirty more Swed- 
ish officers came with him. 

Charlotte Von Braunschweig-Wolfenbuettel. 

A very romantic legend has come down to us from that 
time. It is said that with the German immigrants of the four 
pest ships who arrived in Louisiana in March, 1721, there came 
also Charlotte Christine Sophie, a German princess of the house 
of Braunschweig-Wolfenbuettel, who had been the wife of the 
Czarevitch Alexis, the oldest son of Czar Peter the Great of 
Russia. She is said to have suffered so much from the brutality 
and infidelity of her husband that, in 171 5, four years after her 
marriage, she simulated death, and while an official burial was 
arranged for her, she escaped from Russia, and later came to 
Louisiana, where she married the Chevalier d'Aubant, a French 
officer, whom she had met in Europe. 

Gayarre (Vol. I, page 263) made a very pretty story of this 
legend, and added a touching introductory chapter. According 
to him the Chevalier d'Aubaut, a young Frenchman, was attached 
to the court of Braunschweig as an officer in the duke's house- 
hold. 



32 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

"He had gazed so on the star of beauty, Charlotte, the paragon 
of virtue and of talent in her ambrosial purity of heaven, that he 
had become mad — mad with love! 

Now the princess is on her way to St. Petersburg and her 
bridegroom is with her, and fast travelers are these horses of the 
Ukraine, the wild Mazeppa horses that are speeding away with her. 

In her escort is a young Cossack officer riding closely to the 
carriage door, with watchful care and whenever the horses of the 
vehicle which carried Alexis and his bride threatened to become 
unruly, his hand was always first to interfere and to check them; 
and all other services which chance threw in his way, he would 
render with meek and unobtrusive eagerness ; but silent he was as 
the tomb. 

Once on such an occasion, no doubt as an honorable reward 
for his submissive behavior and faithful attendance, the princess 
beckoned to him to lend her the help of his arm to come down the 
steps of her carriage. Slight was the touch of the tiny hand; light 
was the weight of that sylphlike form: and yet the rough Cossack 
trembled like an aspen leaf, and staggered under the convulsive 
effort which shook his bold frame." 

It was d'Aubant, of course, the Chevalier of the Braun- 
schweig court, her lover in disguise. 

"On the day of their arrival in St. Petersburg he received a 
sealed letter with two papers. One was a letter; it read thus: 
'D'Aubant. 

'Your disguise was not one for me. . It could not deceive my 
heart. Now that I am the wife of another, know for the first time 
my long kept secret — I love you. Such a confession is a declara- 
tion that we must never meet again. The mercy of God be on us 
both.' 

The other paper was a passport signed by the Emperor him- 
self, and giving to the Chevalier d'Aubant permission to leave the 
empire at his convenience. 

In 1718 he arrived in Louisiana with the grade of captain in 
the colonial troops. Shortly after he was stationed at New Orleans, 
where he shunned the contact of his brother officers and lived in 
the utmost solitude. 

On the bank of the Bayou St. John, on the land known in our 
day as the Allard plantation, there was a small village of friendly 
Indians, and beginning where the bridge now spans the bayou, a 
winding path connected it with New Orleans. There the chevalier 
lived, and his dwelling contained a full length portrait of a female 
surpassingly beautiful, in the contemplation of which he would 
frequently remain absorbed, as in a trance, and on a table lay a 
crown, resting not on a cushion, as usual, but on a heart, which it 
crushed with its weight, and at which the lady from out of the 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 33 

picture gazed with intense melancholy. Every one felt that it was 
sacred ground out there on the Bayou St. John. 

It was on a vernal evening, in March, 1721, the last rays of 
the sun were lingering in the west, and d'Aubant was sitting in 
front of the portrait, his eyes rooted to the ground — when sud- 
denly he looked up — gracious heaven! it was no longer an inani- 
mate representation of fictitious life which he saw — it was flesh and 
blood — the dead was alive again and confronting him with a smile 
so sweet and sad — with eyes moist with rapturous tears — and with 
such an expression of concentrated love as can only be borrowed 
from the abode of bliss above. 

Next day they were married, and in commemoration of this 
event they planted those two oaks, which, looking like twins, and 
interlocking their leafy arms, are, to this day, to be seen standing 
side by side on the bank of the Bayou St. John, and bathing their 
feet in the stream, a little to the right of the bridge as you pass in 
front of Allard's plantation." 

Such is Gayarre's account. It is a pity to destroy such a 
pretty legend, but the historian is not the man of sentiment — 
he seeks truth. 

Let us examine this story critically, first acquainting our- 
selves with conditions in Russia, whence it emanated. 

Alexis, the husband of the German princess, was at the 
head of the old Russian party which violently opposed the re- 
forms introduced by the Czar Peter the Great, the father of 
Alexis. A conspiracy was formed by this party to frustrate 
the reforms, and the Czar, fearing for the success of his plans, 
forced Alexis, the heir apparent, to resign his claims to the Rus- 
sian succession and to promise to become a monk. When Peter 
the Great was on his second tour through Western Europe, how- 
ever, Alexis, with the aid of his party, escaped and fled to Aus- 
tria. Very unwisely he allowed himself to be persuaded by Privy 
Counsellor Tolstoi to return from Vienna to Russia, whereupon 
those who had aided him suffered severe punishment, and Alexis 
himself was condemned to death. It is true, the sentence was 
commuted by the Czar, but Alexis died, in 171 8, from mental 
anguish, it was said, but according to others he was beheaded 
in the prison. To meet the accusations of unjust treatment of 
his son, the Czar published the records of the court proceedings, 
proving the conspiracy. 



34 l^he Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

There can be no doubt that the enemies of the Czar, espe- 
cially the very strong and influential old Russian party, did 
everything in their power to make the treatment Alexis had re- 
ceived at the hands of his father appear as one of the blackest 
crimes, and that the Czar's party retaliated by blackening the 
character of the Czarevitch as much as lay in their power. 

At that time, and for the purpose of defaming the character 
of the dead prince, the story that the German princess, his wife, 
had simulated death to escape from the martyrdom of a sup- 
posedly wretched married life, must have been invented by the 
partisans of the Czar. Why should she have gone to Louisiana, 
and nowhere else? Because everybody went to Louisiana at 
that time. It was the year 171 8. That was the very time when 
John Law and the Western Company were spreading their Louis- 
iana pamphlets broadcast over Europe; it was the time when 
thousands of the countrymen of the dead princess were preparing 
themselves to emigrate to the paradise on the Mississippi ; it was 
the time when the name of Louisiana was in the mouth of every 
one. Moreover, Louisiana was at a safe distance — far enough 
away to discourage any attempt to disprove the story. 

The tale, too, was repeated with such persistency that many 
European authors printed it, that thousands believed it, and that 
even official inquiries seem to have been instituted. 

As to the princess' alleged Louisiana husband, the Cheva- 
lier d'Aubant, who was said to have married her in New Orleans 
in March, 1721, the present writer desires to say that he has 
carefully and repeatedly examined the marriage records of New 
Orleans, Mobile and Biloxi from 1720 to 1730 without meeting 
with such a name, or any name similar to it. Moreover, Mr. 
Hamilton, of Mobile, the author of ''Colonial Mobile," ^^ who 
examined the Mobile records completely and with infinite care, 
found only a French officer "d'Aubert" (not d'Aubant), who, in 
1759, thirty-eight years later, commanded at Fort Toulouse; but 
this d'Aubert was married to one Louise Marg. Bernoudy, a 
daughter of a numerous and well-authenticated French pioneer 
family of Mobile. 

" See pages 89 and 164 of that work. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 35 

The story of the romantic Louisiana marriage is therefore 
without foundation, and so the legend is a myth, although Allard's 
plantation, near New Orleans, is pointed out to us as the dwelling 
place of the lovers, and the two "leaflocked oak trees right by the 
bridge still bear witness to their happiness," 

Pickett, in his "History of Alabama," claims the couple as 
residents of Mobile. Zschokke, the German novelist, makes them 
residents of "Christinental on the Red River," and others place 
them in the Illinois district ; i. e., the country north of the Yazoo 
River. 

Martin says the King of Prussia called Charlotte's alleged 
lover "Maldeck." How the King of Prussia was hauled into 
the story can easily be explained. Louisiana was a French prov- 
ince, and (as will be shown in the chapter "Koly") the Prussian 
ambassador at the court of France was either for his own ac- 
count, or as a representative of his king, financially interested in 
the St. Catherine enterprise in Louisiana; and he was therefore 
believed to be in a better position and nearer to the channels of 
information to make inquiries about affairs and people in Louis- 
iana than any other German official in Paris. If, therefore, the 
family of Braunschweig- Wolfenbuettel desired to investigate the 
rumors current at that time, they had no better means of doing 
so than to request the King of Prussia to instruct his ambassador 
in Paris to make researches. The Prussian ambassador possibly 
reported that there was a man in Louisiana, by the name of 
"Maldeck" who claimed his wife to be the princess. 

As to the name of "Maldeck," the writer will say that he 
found that name, or, rather, a name so similar to it that it may 
have stood for the same. In the passenger lists received by 
the "Louisiana Historical Society" from Paris in 1904 (see page 
106), a laborer named "Guillaume Madeck" is mentioned, a 
passenger on the ship "Le Profond," who, from the 8th of 
May, 1720, to the 9th of June, 1720, the day of the departure 
of the vessel for Louisiana, had received thirty-three rations. 
A man of such humble station, however, would certainly not 
have suited a princess for a husband, and so, if the story was 
ever circulated in Louisiana, either Wilhelm Maldeck, or his 
Louisiana wife, claiming to be a princess, must have imposed 
upon the people. 



36 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

John Law^ a Bankrupt and a Fugitive.^^ 

With the ship 'Tortefaix," so La Harpe informs us, the news 
of the failure of John Law and his flight from Paris reached 
the colony of Louisiana. ^^ The news of Law's flight seems to 
have paralyzed the Compagnie des Indes, for it took them 
many months to decide what should be done with Law's con- 
cessions on the Arkansas River and below English Turn. The 
German engages on the Arkansas River, who probably arrived 
there about the end of 1720, or in the spring of 1721, had not 
yet been able to make a crop, as the preparatory work of clearing 
the ground and providing shelter for themselves had occupied 
most of their time, and much sickness also prevailing among 
them, they were unable to begin farming operations on a larger 
scale before August, 1721. 

These Germans therefore needed assistance until they could 
help themselves, for not another livre was to be expected from 
the bankrupt John Law; and the concession must be given up 
unless the company or some one else should step in to provide 
for those people. 

It seems incomprehensible that the directors of the com- 
pany in Louisiana, under these circumstances, should have waited 
from the 4th of June to beyond the middle of November of 
the same year to decide to take Law's concessions over; and even 
after they had decided to manage the concessions in the future 
for their own account, the resolution was not carried out, as 
Law's agent on the Arkansas, Levens, refused to transfer the 

" Law left Paris on the lOth of December, 1720, for one of his estates 
six miles distant. There Madame Brie lent him her coach, and the Regent 
furnished the relays and four of his men for an escort. Thus Law travelled 
towards the Belgian frontier. Returning her coach, Law sent the lady a 
letter containing a ring valued at 100,000 livres. (Schuetz, Leben und Char- 
akter der Elisabeth Charlotte, Herzogin von Orleans, Leipzig, 1820.) 

"This statement of La Harpe cannot be accepted as correct. Law left 
France about the middle of December and the news of his flight spread 
rapidly. The ship La Mutine arrived in Louisiana on the 3d of February; 
the four pest ships which sailed from L'Orient on the 24th of January — 
six weeks after Law's flight — arrived in March; the ship St. Andre, which 
sailed April 13th, came towards the end of May, and a few days later came 
La Durance, which sailed April 23d, and still no news of the disaster? The 
ship Portefaix with D'Arensbourg on board, which arrived on the 4th of 
June, may have brought some instructions concerning the steps to be taken 
in the matter, but the first news must have reached the colony much earlier. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 37 

business to the company or to continue it in the company's name. 
Furthermore, as this man, in spite of his refusal to carry out 
orders, was left undisturbed in his position, ^^ it happened that 
the German engages in the meantime received help neither 
from one side nor from the other to bridge them over to the 
harvesting time of their first crop, but were forced to ask help 
of their only friends, the Arkansas and the Sothui Indians. 
Finally, when help from this last source failed, and small-pox 
broke out among the Indians and the Germans, they were forced 
to give up all and abandon the concession. 

The Germans Leave Law^s Concessions en Masse^ Appear 
IN New Orleans^ and Demand Passage for Europe. 
According to tradition, the Germans on the Arkansas re- 
solved ^^ to abandon Law's concession and to go down the 
Mississippi to New Orleans. Only forty-seven persons remained 
behind, whom La Harpe met there on the 20th of March, 1722, 
when he installed Dudemaine Dufresne, but when La Harpe re- 
turned from his other mission, viz., the search for the imaginary 
"Smaragd Rock" in Arkansas, these too had departed. 

The arrival of the flotilla of the Germans from the Arkan- 
sas River must have been a great surprise for the people of New 
Orleans. This city was at that time in its very infancy, and 
seems to have looked more like a mining camp than a town. 
The engineer Pauget, who went there in March, 1721, to lay 
out the streets, found in the bush only a small number of huts 
covered with palmetto leaves or cypress bark; and the Jesuit 
Charlevoix wrote from New Orleans on the loth of January, 
1722, i. e., immediately before the arrival of the Germans from 
the Arkansas, that New Orleans was a wild, lonely place of 
about a hundred huts, and almost completely covered by trees 
and bushes. He found two or three houses, it is true, but such 
as would not have been a credit to any French village, a large 
wooden warehouse, and a miserable store, one-half of which 
had been lent to the Lord for religious services ; but, he said, the 



" He was replaced only in March, 1722, by Dudemaine Dufresne. 
" It seems to have been at the end of January or in February, 1722. 



38 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

people want the Lord to move out again and to accept shelter 
in a tent. Indeed, New Orleans contained at the taking of the 
census of November 24th, 1721, excluding soldiers and sailors, 
only 169 white persons, and the Germans who came down from 
the Arkansas must have outnumbered them considerably. 

The surprise created by their arrival must have been a 
very unpleasant one for the officials of the Compagnie des Indes. 
Indeed, the Germans did not come to thank them for favors, and 
is it to be imagined that some very plain words were spoken by 
the Germans to the officials of the company ; in fact, it is said that 
Governor Bienville interceded, and when they demanded passage 
back to Europe, tried his best to induce them to remain. 

The results of the conferences were : first, that the Germans 
from the Arkansas were now given rich alluvial lands on the 
right bank of the Mississippi River about twenty-five miles above 
New Orleans, on what is now known as "the German Coast," 
comprising the parishes of St, Charles and St. John the Baptist, 
where, in 1721, two German villages, of which we shall hear 
more, already existed ; secondly, that the agent on the Arkansas, 
Levens, was deposed; and, thirdly, that provisions were sent to 
the Germans who still remained there. 

The Family of D'Arensbourg. 

The family of Charles Fred. D'Arensbourg is very important 
in the history of the German Coast, and as doubts existed until 
now as to its real descent, it will be treated here at some length. 

The former Swedish officer who had charge of the German 
immigrants of the ship "Portefaix" and who became the com- 
mander of the German Coast, signed his name : 



I 




and the tradition among his descendants is that he was a noble- 
man. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 39 

Examining his signature, we notice at the end of the first 
letter a decided downward stroke, making it appear as if this 
downward stroke was intended to serve as an apostrophe, and 
that the man really intended to write "D'arensbourg", a form of 
name which would support the tradition of noble lineage. 

The names of the older nobility being usually names of 
places, we shall now consider the only two places by the name of 
"Arensburg", which exist in Europe: one in the principality of 
Schaumburg-Lippe, Germany, and the other on the island of 
Oesel in the Bay of Riga, province of Livonia, Russia. As the 
principality of Schaumburg-Lippe is in Germany, and as the 
Russian province of Livonia was founded by Germans at Riga, 
in 1200, and belonged to the territory of the "Grerman Knights" 
for centuries, and as the nobility of Livonia and the other Baltic 
provinces have kept their German blood pure to the present day, 
a noble family of that name would in either case be of the Ger- 
man nobility, and the original form of the name would be "von 
Arensburg". 

As our Louisiana D'Arensbourg was a former Swedish 
officer, and as the town of Arensburg on the island of Oesel in 
the Bay of Riga, together with the whole province of Livonia, 
belonged to Sweden up to the year 1721, the year of Chas. Fred. 
D'Arensbourg's emigration to Louisiana, and as thirty other 
Swedish officers are said to have come with him to Louisiana in 
1 72 1, it might be assumed that our Louisiana D'Arensbourg be- 
longed to the Riga branch of the German noble family "von 
Arensburg", and that, at the cession of Livonia to Russia, in 
1 72 1, our D'Arensbourg, together with thirty compatriots, who 
all had fought on the Swedish side against Russia, preferred 
exile to Russification, and emigrated to Louisiana in the year 
1721. 

Wishing to obtain more definite, and, if possible, official in- 
formation as to the descent of this D'Arensbourg, the present 
writer addressed the Imperial German Consul in Riga, and this 
gentleman, "Herr Generalconsul Dr. Ohneseit", kindly submitted 
the questions to the chancellory of the "Livlaendische Ritterschaft, 
Ritterhaus, Riga", where the resident "Landrat" ordered re- 



40 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

searches with the result that the name of "von Arensburg" could 
be found neither in the church records of Livonia nor in the 
records of the "Livlaendische Hofgericht", to whose jurisdiction 
the island of Oesel belonged during the Swedish dominion and 
even later. Both the archivist and the notary of the "Livlaen- 
dische Ritterschaft" write furthermore that no family by the 
name of "von Arensburg" can be found in the literature re- 
lating to the Swedish, the Baltic, the Finnish or the German 
nobility. This settles the question of noble lineage. 

"Herr von Bruningh," the archivist of the "Ritterschaft," 
however, agrees with the author, that "D'Arensbourg" points to 
the island of Oesel as the home of the man. It was also sug- 
gested that the man may have added "d'Arensbourg" to his fam- 
ily name (which must have been "Karl Friedrich") in order to 
indicate his birth place, or place of last residence or garrison, or 
in order to distinguish his family (there being many Fried- 
richs) from other branches of the same name, "which was not 
seldom done." Indeed, there were even several Friedrich fam- 
ilies in Louisiana, and the census of 1724 mentions two of them, 
Nos. 2 and 42 in that census. In this case the change of name 
must have taken place before the departure from France, since 
the commission held by the Swedish officer was issued in the 
name of "Charles Fred. D'Arensbourg." 

The following is offered as a possible solution : The former 
Swedish officer "Karl Friedrich," a German and a native or 
former resident of Arensburg on the island of Oesel, having 
determined to emigrate to Louisiana rather than become a Rus- 
sian subject, applied to the Compagnie des Indes for a position 
in the colony, and in his petition, written in French, signed his 
name "Charles Friedrich," and added to it "d'Arensbourg" to 
indicate his birthplace, or place of last residence or garrison. 
The French officials, mistaking "d'Arensbourg" for his family 
name, issued his commission to "Charles Frederic d'Arens- 
bourg;" and it being thus entered on the books of the com- 
pany, and the man being known and addressed officially in that 
way, he was forced to adopt this as his family name. 

The wife of D'Arensbourg, too, is said to have been a 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 41 

Swedish lady, and her name, according to our historians, was 
"Catherine Mextrine." This is surely an error, for the author 
finds that D'Arensbourg was a single man when he came to 
Louisiana, in 172 1. At least the census of 1724 mentions him 
as a bachelor, aged thirty-one, though the census of 1726 re- 
ports him as having a wife and one child. D'Arensbourg was, 
therefore, married in Louisiana, and we shall prove that his 
wife's name was neither "Catherine" nor "Mextrine," and that 
she was not from Sweden, but from "Schwaben" (Wiirtem- 
berg). 

The last three letters "ine" of the name "Mextrine" alone 
betray her as a German woman. It is the suffix "in," which 
was formerly added to the family names of married ladies in 
Germany. We had a German poetess by the name of "Kar- 
schin," the wife of a tailor named "Karsch;" the wife of a Mr. 
Meyer used to be called "Frau Meyerin," and I still remember 
that old people used to call my good mother "Frau Deilerin." 

The French officials in Louisiana used to add an "e" to the 
"in" in order to retain the German pronunciation of the suffix. 
Thus the church records of Louisiana have: 

Folsine, i. e., the wife of Foltz, 
Lauferine, i. e., the wife of Laufer, and 
Chaff erine, i. e., the wife of Schaefer. 

The "x" in Mextrine is a makeshift for the German hiss- 
ing sound of "z" or "tz," for which there is no special sign in 
French, "z" in French sounding always like a soft "s." 

In proof of all this a facsimile of the signature of "Cather- 
ine Mextrine" is given here, which the author found in the mar- 
riage contract entered into between her granddaughter, Marie 
de la Chaise, and Frangois Chauvin de Lery on the 23d of July, 
1763: 



fni/^/oTler/jv 



It will be noticed that she signed her name without the 
final French "e," just as a German woman of that time would 
have written the feminine form of the name "Metzer." 



42 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Her family name, then, was "Metzer," and according to 
family tradition she was from Wurtemberg. The present writer 
is incHned to think that she was the daughter of one Jonas "Mes- 
quer" (French spelHng), who, according to the passenger lists, 
sailed with his wife and five children on the 13th of April, 1721, 
on board the ship "St. Andre" from L'Orient for Louisiana. 

In the marriage contract of her eldest son, who married 
Frangoise de la Vergne on the i8th of June, 1766, the mother 
of the bridegroom is called by the French notary "Marguerite 
Mettcherine." Here we also have her Christian name which 
corresponds with the initial of her own signature. It is not 
"Catherine" but "Marguerite," a favorite German name for 
women. 

Karl Friedrich D'Arensburg served for more than forty 
years as commander and judge of the German Coast of Louis- 
iana, sharing alike the joys and hardships of his people, and on 
one occasion, at least, taking an important part in political mat- 
ters. 

It is the proper place here to mention the part he, then a 
man of seventy-six years of age, played in the rebellion against 
the Spanish in 1768. 

Ulloa, the Spanish governor, who had come to Louisiana in 
March, 1766, to take possession of the colony in the name of the 
King of Spain, to whom France had ceded Louisiana in 1763, 
had found the population very hostile ; and, as he had only ninety 
soldiers with him, he did not formally take possession of Louis- 
iana, but requested the French commander to hold over and act 
under Spanish authority until more Spanish troops should arrive. 
This interim lasted until the 28th of October, 1768, when the 
people rose and Ulloa was forced to retire to Havana. 

During this year Ulloa had taken from the Germans of the 
German Coast provisions to the value of 1500 piastres to feed 
the Acadians, who had but recently come into the colony, and 
were not able yet to sustain themselves. ^"^ 



"On the 28th of February, 1765, 230 persons, natives of Acadia (Nova 
Scotia) arrived in Louisiana. They came from San Domingo, where they 
had found the climate too hot, and were in great misery. Their whole for- 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 43 

Hearing of the ferment all over the colony, and fearing 
that the Germans might make the nonpayment of their claims 
a pretext to join the conspirators, Ulloa, on the 25th of October, 
1768, sent a man by the name of Maxant with 1500 piastres to 
the German Coast to settle the indebtedness of the Spanish 
government. 

In a letter dated Havana, December 4th, 1768, one day 
after his arrival from New Orleans ("Notes and Documents," 
page 892) Ulloa says: 

"In the early morning after Maxant's departure Lafreniere and 
Marquis sent Villere and Andre Verret in pursuit of Maxant to 
prevent the remitting of the money to the Germans, fearing that if 
he should satisfy them they might no longer have any motive to 
join the cause of the conspirators. 

"Maxant arrived at the habitation of D'Arensbourg for whom I 
had given him a letter and when he delivered it to him he found him 
to be so different a man from what he expected him to be — in spite 
of his great age determined to defend liberty and neither wanting 
to be a subject of the king (of Spain), nor the country to belong to 
the king. 

"Maxant was arrested by Verret on the place of Cantrelle, the 
father-in-law of another Verret and Commander of the Acadians, 
where he was much maltreated. Verret declared later that he 
received the order to arrest Maxant from Villere, Lafreniere and 
Marquis," 

Ulloa in this letter expresses the belief that D'Arensbourg 
had been influenced by his relatives, Villere, the commander of 
the German militia, and de Lery, the commander of the militia 
in Chapitoulas. It is true that Villere was married to Louise de 
la Chaise, and Frangois Chauvin de Lery to Marie de la Chaise, 
both granddaughters of D'Arensbourg, that de Lery was a first 
cousin to Chauvin Lafreniere, the attorney general of the col- 
tune consisted of only 47,000 livres in Canadian paper, which the people of 
Louisiana refused to accept. Focault demanded permission from Paris to 
reimburse them, gave them 14,000 livres worth of merchandise and provisions, 
and sent them to Opelousas and the country of the Attakapas. 

On the 4th of May, 1765, 80 persons from Acadia arrived and went to 
Opelousas. 

On the Sth of May, 1765, 48 Acadian families arrived and were sent to 
Opelousas. 

On the i6th of November, 1766, 216 Acadians arrived from Halifax. 
They were sent to "Cahabanoce," the present parish of St. James. These 
were the ones who received the provisions which the Spanish government 
took from the Germans on the German Coast. 



44 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

ony and orator of the rebellion, whose daughter was the wife of 
Noyan, the leader of the Acadians. 

But it needed no persuasion to make D'Arensbourg take the 
stand which he took, for Ulloa himself had furnished more than 
sufficient grounds to make him do so : 

Ulloa had forbidden the flourishing trade with the English 
neighbors (September 6th, 1766) ; 

He had closed the mouths of the Mississippi, except one where 
the passage for vessels was most difficult and dangerous ; 

He had refused to pay the costs of administration since the 
transfer of Louisiana to Spain (1763), and wanted to be responsible 
only for the obligations incurred since his arrival (March, 1766), 
thereby repudiating the salaries of officials, officers, and soldiers for 
three years ; 

He had imposed crushing burdens on export and import — vessels 
from Louisiana must offer their cargoes for sale first in Spain, and 
only when there were no purchasers in Spain were they allowed to 
go to the ports of other countries, whence they had to return to 
Spain in ballast, for only there could they load for Louisiana ; 

And, finally, by ordinance published May 3d, 1768, he pro- 
hibited commerce with France and the French West Indies. 

This last ordinance was the most terrible blow of all for 
the colony. The flourishing lumber trade with San Domingo 
and Martinique was ruined thereby, and, with the ports of 
France closed, and only those of Spain open, the Louisiana 
products were at once thrown into direct and absolutely ruinous 
competition with those of Spanish America; for Guatemala fur- 
nished better indigo, the Isle of Pines more tar and resin, and 
Havana better tobacco than Louisiana. 

All this tended to depress prices for the Louisiana products. 
Furthermore, would the colonists find a market for their goods 
in Spain as they had in France? Louisiana peltries received in 
trade from the Indians, the chief staple of the Indian trade, 
had less value in Spain, because they were used less there than 
in France; and the industries of Spain, much inferior to those 
of France, could not furnish the colonists with the class of goods 
which they needed to compete with the English traders in the 
Indian trade. Add to this the uncertainty as to the fate of the 
French paper circulating in Louisiana, and it will be easily un- 
derstood that values of all kinds depreciated fully fifty per cent. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 45 

In addition to these hardships it must not be forgotten that, if 
this ordinance had been put in force, every man, woman, and 
child in the colony would have been compelled to give up their 
beloved Bordeaux wine and drink the "vin abominable de Cata- 
logne." 

All these reasons combined were surely enough to deter- 
mine D'Arensbourg, who before the publication of the ordinance 
prohibiting trade with France seems to have acquiesced in the 
Spanish dominion, to take the stand he took. Indeed he did 
not need the persuasion of his relatives. No other stand was pos- 
sible. 

It was on the German Coast that the Revolution of 
1768 began. D'Arensbourg, the patriarch of the Germans, defied 
the messenger of the Spanish governor; and it was surely 
D'Arensbourg's word and D'Arensbourg's influence that enabled 
Villere to march two days later with 400 Germans upon New 
Orleans where the Germans took the Chapitoulas Gate on the 
morning of October 28th. The Acadians under Noyan, the 
militia of Chapitoulas under de Lery and the people of the town 
followed; and on the morning of the 29th they marched upon 
the public square (Jackson Square) before the building of the 
Superior Council to support the demand of Lafreniere to give 
Ulloa three days' time to leave Louisiana. The resolution was 
carried, and the people greeted the news with shouts of : "Vive le 
roi"! "Vive Louis le bien aime!" "Vive le vin de Bordeaux!" 
"A bas le poison de Catalogue!"^* Ulloa left on the ist of 
November on a French vessel for Havana. 

The success of the revolution was due chiefly to Lafreniere, 
the Canadian orator, to Marquis, a Swiss and the commander of 
the revolutionary forces, who wanted to found a republic after 
the pattern of Switzerland, and to D'Arensbourg and the Ger- 
man and the Canadian militia. 

A few Spanish officers having remained when Ulloa sailed, 
and Ulloa's frigate having been left behind "for repairs," the 
colonists frequently gave vent to their hostility to the Spanish; 



'Franz in his "Kolonisation des Mississippitales" (Leipzig, 1906). 



46 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

and in December a petition to the Superior Council was circu- 
lated demanding the removal of both the Spanish officers and 
the ship. A resolution to that effect was adopted by the Council, 
but it was never put into effect. 

Meanwhile the news expected from France, where a com- 
mission of prominent Louisianians had petitioned the king to 
take possession of the colony again, did not arrive, and the 
hopes of the leaders of the rebellion against Spanish rule began 
to waver. They did not wish now to risk an attack on the 
Spanish frigate, and when the Germans of the German Coast 
threatened to march again to New Orleans to drive out the 
Spaniards, Lafreniere himself became alarmed and persuaded 
them to desist. 

On the 24th of July, 1769, the news reached the city that 
the Spanish general O'Reilly had arrived at the mouth of the 
Mississippi with large forces to take possession of Louisiana. 
Again Marquis called the people to the public square, and im- 
plored them to defend their liberties; and again the Germans 
from the German Coast entered the city to oppose O'Reilly's 
entrance. But most of the others had already resolved to sur- 
render, and so the Germans too had to give up their design. 

Six of the leaders of the revolution were condemned to 
death, among them Villere, Lafreniere, Marquis, and Noyan. 
Tradition informs us that O'Reilly intended also to have D'Arens- 
bourg included, but that the latter was saved through the inter- 
cession of Forstall, under whose uncle O'Reilly is said to have 
served in the Hibernian regiment in Spain. 

D'Arensbourg was made a chevalier of the French military 
order of St. Louis on the 31st of August, 1765, and died on 
November i8th, 1777. His wife died December 13th, 1776. 
They left numerous descendants. 

The German Coast. 

The district to which Law's Germans from the Arkansas 
River were sent after their descent to New Orleans begins about 
twenty-five miles (by river) above New Orleans, and extends 
about forty miles up the Mississippi on both banks. 

The land is perfectly level; at the banks of the river, how- 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 47 

€ver, it is a little, almost imperceptibly, higher, because of the 
deposit the Mississippi had left there at every overflow. At a 
distance from one to three miles from the river it becomes lower, 
and gradually turns into cypress swamps, so that on each side of 
the Mississippi only a strip from two to three miles in width is 
capable of being cultivated. For this reason land there is esti- 
mated only according to the arpent river front, to each arpent 
front belonging forty arpents in depth. This is what is called in 
deeds "the usual depth." An arpent is about 182 feet. 

Large dikes, called "levees," now restrain the Mississippi 
from spreading over the lands in time of high water; but as 
the sediment deposited continually raises the river bed, the 
levees, too, must be made higher and higher. They are now from 
twenty to thirty feet high, the celebrated Morganza levee meas- 
uring even thirty-five feet. On this account, only the roofs of 
two-story houses can be seen from the middle of the river. 

The crown of the levee, where a delightful breeze is found 
even during the hottest part of the day, is from six to ten feet 
wide, affording, besides a beautiful view of the Mississippi and 
the vast area of level land back to the cypress swamps, a very 
pleasant promenade where the people love to gather. 

Along the inland base of the levee runs the only wagon road 
up the coast,^® and still farther inland, between majestic shade 
trees or groves, stand the palatial mansions of the planters with 
their numerous outhouses. Some distance in the rear are the 
sugar houses with their big chimneys; and from these a wide 
street, lined with a double row of little white cabins with two 
or four rooms each, leads to the fields. In the days of slavery 
this was the negro quarters, but now the free laborers and field 
hands, mostly Italians, live there. 

The fields, whose furrows run invariably at right angles with 
the river, extend as far as the eye can see, to the cypress forests 
in the swamps. Every fifty or sixty feet a narrow but deep 
and well kept ditch runs in the same direction; little railroads 
lead from the fields, whence they carry the sugar cane to the 
sugar houses, and in the month of November, when the grinding 

cSte 

" The banks of the Mississippi River are called "coast." Hence the "Ger- 
man Coast." 



48 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

season begins, these fields, with the waving sugar cane, afford' 
a beautiful sight. Four important railroads, running parallel to 
the Mississippi, intersect the rear of the plantations, the Yazoo 
& Mississippi Valley and the Louisiana Railway and Navigation 
Co.'s line on one side of the Mississippi, and the Southern and 
the Texas Pacific on the other. Between New Orleans and 
Baton Rouge, the people plant mostly sugar cane, but also some 
rice and corn. Beyond Baton Rouge, cotton takes the place of 
the sugar cane. 

In some places wide strips of torn up land, with hollows 
and trenches scooped out, and with little hills of deposit extend 
from the river to the swamp. These are places where the Mis- 
sissippi has broken through the levee, its mighty waters rushing 
with a roar heard for miles down upon the land twenty or thirty 
feet below, wrecking houses, uprooting trees, carrying off fences, 
and inundating and devastating hundreds of miles of the richest 
lands. 

Little crawfishes from the river sometimes crawl up to the 
base of the levee and work their way through the earth masses. 
The water follows them, and all of a sudden a little spring bub- 
bles up on the inland slope of the levee. If this is not discov- 
ered at once by the guards watching at high water time day and 
night, it widens rapidly until the earth from the top tumbles 
down, and a "crevasse" results. However small this opening 
may be in the beginning, it will, through the crumbling away 
of both ends, soon extend hundreds of feet, and so great is the 
force of the current that even large Mississippi steamers have 
been carried through such breaks. 

Woe to the planter who does not, at the first warning, flee 
with his people and his stock to some safe place on the crown 
of the levee where rescue steamers can reach them. 

Sometimes also defective rice flumes, laid through the levee 
to obtain water for the rice fields, have caused crevasses. 

On the left bank of the German Coast, between Montz and 
La Place, two stations of the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Rail- 
way, such a strip of torn up land may be seen. Here was 
"Bonnet Carre Crevasse (April nth, 1874) which was 1370 
feet wide, from twenty-five to fifty-two feet deep and which 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 49 

remained open for eight years. Further up the river, and on 
the same side, near Oneida (Welham station of the same rail- 
road) was "Nita Crevasse," which occurred on the 13th of 
March, 1890, and was 3000 feet wide. Both these crevasses 
did immense damage even to the German farmers near Frenier, 
more than ten miles distant from the break, where the crevasse 
water entered Lake Pontchartrain and washed so much land 
into the lake that houses which stood 150 feet from the shore 
had to be moved back. 

This is the German Coast of to-day. At the time of the 
settling of the German pioneers, in 1721, it was quite different. 
There were no levees then, and the whole country was a howling 
wilderness. 

This district was called "La Cote des Allemands," but 
usually only "Aux Allemands." During the Spanish period 
(after 1768) it was called "El Puerto des Alemanes," and when 
the district was divided there were a "Primera Costa de los Ale- 
manes" and a "Segunda Costa." Since 1802 the lower part has 
been called "St. Charles Parish," and the upper "St. John the 
Baptist Parish." 




50 The Settlement of the German Coast of iLouisiana 

The First Villages on the German Coast. 

The weight of authority and tradition among our Creole 
population of German descent up to the present time has favored 
the legend that Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg, who came to Louis- 
ana on the ship "Portefaix" on the fourth of June, 1721, was the 
leader of the Germans already on the Arkansas River, and that 
he came down from there with Law's Germans to the German 
Coast. 

Careful researches and the finding of new material until 
recently unavailable have convinced the writer that this legend 
can no longer be entertained. D'Arensbourg never was on the 
Arkansas River, and the Germans from there were not the first 
Germans on the German Coast. There had been established two 
German villages on the German Coast prior to the arrival there 
of the people from the Arkansas River. 

Here are the facts: 

The census of 1724, a most important document, a copy of 
which was received by the "Louisiana Historical Society" from 
Paris, in December, 1904, mentions two old German villages, ten 
lieues (about thirty miles) above New Orleans on the right 
bank. "Le premier ancien village allemand" was one and a half 
miles inland from the Mississippi, the second three quarters of 
a mile, and between the two lay a tract of four arpents of land, 
which had been cleared by the community to serve as a ceme- 
tery. When the census of 1724 was taken the people of the 
second village (the one nearer to the Mississippi) had all been 
three years on their lands. This throws the founding of the 
second village into the year 1721. 

The first German village ("le premier ancien village alle- 
mand") i. e., the one remoter from the Mississippi, was founded,, 
so the census says, by twenty-one German families, but the time 
of the founding is not given. These twenty-one families must 
have come before the others, otherwise their village would not 
have been called "le premier ancien village allemand." 

As Penicaut informed us that in 1719 the ship "Les Deux 
Freres" brought a number of German people, "with all sorts 
of merchandise and effects which belonged to them," and as 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 51 

these evidently were people of some means, who wanted to become 
independent settlers, we may assume that they were the founders 
of "le premier ancien village allemand," one and a half miles 
inland from the Mississippi River. The census of 1724 informs 
us that the people of the first village, when they left their homes 
in consequence of the inundation of 1721, abandoned 100 arpents 
of "beautifully cleared lands." As it took time to clear these 
lands it is easy to see, that the first village must have been settled 
much earlier than the second. 

In September, 1721, so the census of 1724 continues, the 
people of the two old villages were drowned out by the storm 
water of the "great hurricane," and the waters of the lake. 
This storm^® lasted five days. The wind blew first from the 
southeast, then from the south, and, finally, from the southwest. 
There being large bodies of water in the rear of the German 
Coast, "Lac des Allemands" on the north, "Lake Salvador" on 
the south, and the "Bayou des Allemands" connecting the two, 
it must have been the waters of these which were hurled against 
the two German villages. 

Over 8000 quarts of rice, ready for the harvest, were lost 
in this storm. In New Orleans most of the houses were blown 
down; in Biloxi the magazines were wrecked "to the great sat- 
isfaction of the keepers, this accident relieving them from the 
obligation of rendering their accounts." In Ocean Springs "one 
had the great sorrow to lose a great quantity of artillery, of 
lead, and provisions, which had been a long time on board a 
freight ship stranded near Old Biloxi, and which for more than 
a year they had neglected to put ashore." It will be remembered 
that during the summer of 1721, while these provisions were 
lying in the stranded vessel at Ocean Springs, the Germans on 



"The year of the great storm is stated differently by Louisiana writers. 
The reason for this is the fact that several of the older authorities relied 
upon began to write their works many years after these occurrences, and, so 
it seems, partly from memory; and therefore confused dates in the retro- 
spect. But the official census of 1724, having been taken but three years 
after the great storm, on the spot, and while everything was yet fresh in the 
minds of the people may be relied upon as absolutely correct. That part of 
the census reporting the great storm is dated September 12th, 1724, and 
says, on page 86: "lis furent noyes il y a trois ans lors de I'ouragon par la 
pluye et par les eaux du lac que le vent jetta sur leur terrain quoy qu'ik en 
eloignez de deux a trois lieues." 



52 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

the other side of the bay were allowed to starve by the hun- 
dreds. 

According to the census of 1724, some of the inundated 
families of the two old German villages on the German Coast 
died, others moved to the river front, where the land was higher, 
and only three : Diehl, Schenck and Kobler, were found in "le 
premier ancien village allemand" by the census enumerator of 
1724. 

The second village, the one nearer to the Mississippi, was 
also partly abandoned, and the people from there also moved 
to the river bank; but fourteen households, including those of 
four widows, remained behind. On the river bank a new estab- 
lishment was founded. 

All this happened in the year 1721, when the Germans of 
Law were yet on the Arkansas River. It has, therefore, been 
proved that there were two German villages on the German Coast 
before the Arkansas people came down the Mississippi. 

Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg and the Founders of the 
Second German Village on the German Coast. 

Having ascertained now beyond a doubt that there were two 
German villages on the German Coast of Louisiana before the 
ai rival of the people from the Arkansas River, and having ven- 
tured a suggestion as to the people who were the founders of 
the first village, we shall now attempt to answer the question: 
"Whence came the Germans who founded the second village?" 

As has already been stated, the "Portefaix" arrived in Lou- 
isiana on the 4th of June, 1721, with 330 passengers, mostly 
Germans under the leadership of Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg. 
Why this time a special leader for engages if these were intended 
for John Law's concessions? Every concessioner managed his 
engages through his own officers, and D'Arensbourg was not in 
the employ of Law, for his commission, issued January 9th, 1721, 
was not a commission by John Law, but by the Compagnie des 
Indes. Unusual conditions must have obtained to cause the com- 
pany to send a special officer with these German emigrants. 

La Harpe informs us that the same ship brought the news 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 53 

of John Law's bankruptcy and flight from Paris. That Law 
was bankrupt and a fugitive at that time is a fact. He had fled 
from Paris to Brussels on the loth of December, 1720. It is 
certain, therefore, that the Compagnie des Indes in Paris knew, 
in December, 1720, if not before, that there was no further 
need of sending people for Law's enterprises in Louisiana, as 
Law could^ not hold his concessions any longer, and could not 
support the people working for him in Louisiana until they could 
make their first crop to support themselves. The company, fur- 
thermore, knew that the sending of any more engages for the 
Law enterprises would only increase its embarrassment and still 
more complicate matters on the Arkansas River. 

What disposition, then, was the company to make of the 
many hundred Germans whom the agents of Law had engaged 
in Germany before the bankruptcy of their master, and who were 
now in the French ports clamoring for passage for Louisiana? 
There were only two ways out of the dilemma. Having these 
people on its hands and ready to sail when the catastrophe oc- 
curred, the company might decide to have them distributed among 
the other concessioners in Louisiana; but this would not have 
necessitated the sending along with them of a special officer, 
for the company's officials in Louisiana could have attended to the 
distribution. The company, secondly, might decide to keep the 
people together after their arrival in Louisiana, to organize them 
into a body, and to establish a new community with them. If this 
was the intention, then it was but natural to select as their leader 
and head an officer of their own nationality, a man speaking 
the German language. D'Arensbourg filled this condition, and, 
moreover, he was supposed to be a German nobleman, to whose 
authority the Germans would willingly submit. 

At this point the date of D'Arensbourg's appointment as- 
sumes special importance. His commission was issued in Paris 
on the 9th of January, 1721, i. e., shortly after the flight of 
John Law, and at the very time when the need of such a man 
was urgent. The writer is, therefore, of the opinion that the 
company, after the flight of Law, decided to send no more 



54 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Germans to the Law concessions in Louisiana, but to organize 
under the leadership of D'Arensbourg the Grermans still in the 
ports of France, and to begin a new settlement with them some- 
where in Louisiana. 

Of the German engages in the ports of France at this crit- 
ical juncture, 875 Germans and 66 Swiss left France on the 24th 
of January, 1721, on the four pest ships spoken of on a pre- 
vious page. Two hundred of them arrived in Biloxi during 
March, where their number was again greatly reduced by the 
terrible epidemic then prevailing. 

Why D'Arensbourg was not sent with the first ships sailing 
after his appointment may be due to the fact that a stay of 
several months of these people in Biloxi was expected, and 
that D'Arensbourg's presence was not needed, as the company 
had its headquarters in Biloxi, and its officials there could take 
care of the Germans on their arrival in Louisiana. So D'Arens- 
bourg brought up the rear, and came with the last troop on 
board "Portefaix," reaching Biloxi on the 4th of June and meet- 
ing there the sad relics of the pest, ships and the few survivors 
of the epidemic, a number of them widows and orphans. 

There is no doubt that a number of the passengers of the 
"Portefaix," too, succumbed to the epidemic which was still 
raging in Biloxi when that ship arrived, and that D'Arens- 
bourg then, merging the survivors of the different troops into 
one body, departed with them for the banks of the Mississippi. 
Where he went to form a settlement the writer has been able 
to ascertain partly from the passenger lists and partly from the 
census of 1724. 

Six out of the fourteen German families still found in 
1724 in the partly abandoned second old German village, three 
quarters of a mile from the Mississippi, were survivors of the 
pest ships D'Arensbourg had met in Biloxi ; and Schenck, Diehl, 
and Kobler, the three families which had moved from the second, 
partly abandoned, to the first, totally abandoned, village, had also 
been passengers on the pest ships. If the passenger list of the 
"Portefaix" were available, it would perhaps show that the re- 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 55 

mainder of the fourteen households of the second village con- 
sisted of passengers of the "Portefaix." Finally, D'Arensbourg's 
own land, twelve arpents, was between the two old German vil- 
lages and adjoining the cemetery, which was midway between 
the villages. 

All the people of the second village having been three years 
on their lands in 1724, (see census of that year) there can be 
no doubt that D'Arensbourg and his people settled on this place 
in 1 72 1, and instead of going up to the Arkansas River founded 
the "second old German village." 

When the first village and part of the second village were 
abandoned after the hurricane of September, 1721, and a new 
establishment was founded on the river bank, D'Arensbourg re- 
mained on his land between the two old villages ; and when, after 
the completion of the new cemetery and the chapel on the river 
bank, Oberle and Hecker, two Germans from the second village, 
took possession of the old cemetery, D'Arensbourg, as judge and 
commander, claimed this land adjoining his own for himself on 
the ground that it had been cleared by the old community for a 
cemetery and was, therefore, public land. 

According to a map oi the year 1731 (Crown Maps) this 
chapel stood on the river bank, on the place now known by the 
name of "Le Sassier," or "Trinity Plantation;" and about one 
mile below the chapel, but on the opposite bank of the Missis- 
sippi, was a small military post with one gun mounted "en 
barbette." 

The old villages, including D'Arensbourg's own land, had 
been called "Karlstein," no doubt in honor of the first judge 
and commander of the German Coast, Karl Friedrich D'Arens- 
bourg, but the new establishment on the river front was given 
another name. There, in the new village on the river bank, the 
Germans from the Arkansas River, coming down the Mississippi 
on their way to New Orleans, must have met their countrymen; 
and this meeting must have been a great incentive for the Ar- 
kansas people to accept Bienville's offer of lands above and be- 
low the river front village of their countrymen on the German 
Coast. 



56 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

This also explains why we hear from now on of three Ger- 
man villages on the river front, the village of the D'Arensbourg 
people in the center, and two villages of the Arkansas people, 
one above and the other below the first : "Hoffen," "Mariental," 
and "Augsburg." The name Karlstein was retained for the lit- 
tle settlement in the rear, and Karlstein being the name of the 
residence of the commander and judge of the German Coast, 
it gradually superseded all the other names. The little map on 
page 49 bears the inscription: "Les Allemands ou Carlstain." 

Hardships and Difficulties Encountered by the German 

Pioneers. 

No pen can describe, nor human fancy imagine the hard- 
ships which the German pioneers of Louisiana suffered even 
after they had survived the perils of the sea, and epidemics and 
starvation on the sands of Biloxi. No wonder that so many 
perished. Had they been of a less hardy race, not one of these 
families would have survived. 

It should be remembered that the land assigned to them was 
virgin forest in the heavy alluvial bottoms of the Mississippi, 
with their tremendous germinating powers awakened by a semi- 
tropical sun. Giant oaks with wide-spreading arms and gray 
mossy beards stood there as if from eternity, and defied the axe 
of man. Between them arose towering pines with thick under- 
growth, bushes and shrubs and an impenetrable twist of run- 
ning, spinning, and climbing vines, under whose protection 
lurked a hell of hostile animals and savage men. Leopards, 
bears, panthers, wild cats, snakes, and alligators, and their terri- 
ble allies, a scorching sun, the miasma rising from the disturbed 
virgin soil, and the floods of a mighty river, — all these com- 
bined to destroy the work of man and man himself. There were 
no levees then, no protecting dams, and only too often when the 
spring floods came, caused by the simultaneous melting of the 
snow in the vast region of the upper course of the Mississippi 
and its tributaries, the colonists were driven to climb upon the 
roofs of their houses, and up into the trees, and hundreds of 
miles of fertile lands were inundated. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 57 




Mississippi Levee in Front of St. John the Baptist Church 
"aux Allemands." 



The following petition, perhaps one of many similar ones 
in that year, the author found among official acts: 

"a messieurs du conseil superieur de la nouvelle regie. 

Le nomme Jean Jacob Foltz habitant allemand, prend la liberte 
de vous representer tres humblement, que I'annee passee il auroit 
este innondee sur son habitation par le Mississippi, de sorte qu'apres 
avoir travaillee pandant tout I'annee il na pen recoultire que sept 
bary de Ris, et se trouvent aujourdhuy dans la dernier necessitet 
aveque une femme et un enfant, c'est pour ce done il requet 

Ce considere messieurs il vous plaise de luy accorder quelque 
quart de Ris pour pouvoir subsister aveque sa famille jusque' a sa 
recolte, les quelles il s'oblige de rendre a la dite recolte. C'est la 
Grace qu'ill espere de vos bontets ordinaires, il priras Dieu pour 
votre Sante et prosperitet, a la Nouvelle Orleans, 12 May, 1725. 

(Signed) Jacob Foltz. 

The petitioner informs the Superior Council that his place 
had been inundated by the Mississippi in the preceding year, and 



58 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

to such an extent that, after a whole year's work, he had been 
able to harvest only seven barrels of rice, and that he finds him- 
self now with his family, consisting of his wife and a child, 
in the direst need. For this reason he petitions the Council 
to advance him some rice so that he may be able to sustain his 
family until next harvest, when he promises to pay back the 
rice advanced to him. According to a note on the margin of 
the document, the prayer was granted on the same day. The 
census of 1724 confirms the statement that Foltz had made only 
seven barrels of rice that year, and adds that he was sick the 
whole summer. 

When the arduous work of clearing the land was done, the 
tilling of the soil began. With plow? Oh no! The company 
des Indes did not furnish plows. But why do we speak of plows ? 
There were no horses nor oxen to draw them. The census of 
1 73 1 shows that, ten years after the arrival of the Germans, 
there was not yet a single horse on the whole German Coast; 
and the census of 1724 proves that, out of fifty-six German 
families enumerated, only seven had been given a cow each. 

It is true there were 262 horses in 1731 outside of New 
Orleans, and the Tunica Indians also had thirty; but the 262 
horses had been given by the company only to large planters, 
and the Indians had obtained theirs from the Spaniards. There 
were no horses for the German small farmers. All that was 
done for them up to the year 1731 was to sell to them occasion- 
ally a negro, for whom they had to grant the company a mort- 
gage on all their movable and immovable property. 

No draught animals, no plows, no cows, no wagons to haul 
the products — everything had to be carried home as best one 
could. Perhaps the Compagnie des Indes gave the colonists 
some wheel barrows, but there is not to be found any mention 
even of them. The only agricultural implements furnished were 
pickaxe, hoe, and spade. Imagine people working with these in 
the hot sun, on the hard ground and with bodies racked with 
malarial fever! 

And when the day's work in the field was done, there was 
no evening rest inviting them home; for now began the heavy 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 59 

work on the "pilon," the hand mill, or pounding trough, to 
crush the corn and rice for their scanty meals. No meat ! Where 
should it be obtained? The killing of cows was a crime at that 
time (and there were so few to kill!) and the people working 
during the day in the fields to utter exhaustion could not go 
hunting for game, and had not the means to keep an Indian 
hunter as most of the large concessioners did. 

Rice, corn, and beans. 

Corn, beans, and rice, 

Beans, rice, and corn 
constituted their daily fare, and Mississippi water their drink. 
No chickens, not an tgg\ The company did not furnish chick- 
ens. A pig or two, that was all ! Chickens were furnished only 
by Governor Bienville, and only to those on Bienville's own land 
immediately above the city of New Orleans, to raise poultry 
for the city and to pay part of their ground rent to Monsieur 
Bienville in capons. 

One can not blame the French engages for running away 
from such a miserable existence. There is in Louisiana a popu- 
lar saying, which is occasionally heard from Creoles when they 
speak of work uncommonly hard: 

"It takes German people to do that." 

Such is the reputation these German pioneers made for 
themselves in Louisiana! Yes, it took German people! They 
stood their work manfully, and most of them lay down and died 
long before their time ! 

Troubles With the Indians. 

The Indians, too, were a source of constant worry, especi- 
ally so about the year 1729, when the great massacre of the 
French, and also of some Germans, occurred in Natchez. Posts 
of observation were then established along the German Coast on 
high trees on the river bank, and when the men went out in the 
fields, women- with flint-lock firearms went up into the tops of 
the trees to keep a sharp lookout, and to warn the men by shots 
when Indians sneaked out of the swamps and approached the 
habitations. 



6o The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

In the war following the Natchez massacre, the people of 
the German Coast seem to have taken a very active and a very 
creditable part. Charlevoix (IV., 269) says: 

"The habitants commanded by Messrs. D'Arensbourg and de 
Laye (the director of the Meure concession, the river front of which 
was occupied by Germans) did also very well. They were also in- 
clined to do with good will all the work that they were ordered 
to do." 

Even as late as 1747 and 1748 Indian raids and depreda- 
tions are reported. Most of these attacks were made upon the 
villages on the left bank, by Indians who were incited, armed, 
and often led by English traders. It was for this reason that 
the small military post on the German Coast, a wooden enclosure 
with one gun "en barbette," was built on the left side of the 
river. 

In consequence of such instigation by the English, on the 
8th of April, 1747, a band of Chacta Indians under their chief 
Bonfouca made a raid on the left bank of the Mississippi. On 
this occasion one German was killed, his wife wounded, and their 
daughter, together with three negroes and two negritoes, carried 
off as prisoners. The German girl was sold by the Indians to 
English traders, who took her to Carolina, "where the English 
governor was very active in stirring up other Indian nations to 
invade the Colony of Louisiana." 

Then many Germans, fearing that the whole Chacta nation 
was on the war path, fled to New Orleans, and in order to in- 
duce them to return to their homes, soldiers had to be sent with 
them for their protection. When these, later, were withdrawn, 
the Germans crossed over to the right bank of the Mississippi 
where their principal establishments were, and "abandoned their 
houses and their well cultivated fields to the enemy and to the 
discretion of their animals." Thus governor Vaudreuil wrote on 
November 9th, 1748. 

Another raid took place on November 9th, 1748. Indians 
appeared on the left bank "aux Allemands," on the habitation 
of one "Chuave" (Schwab) who had recently died. They found 
two Frenchmen there, Boucherau and Rousseau, and two ne- 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 6i 

groes. All these were killed with the exception of a negro, who, 
having received only flesh wounds, jumped into the Mississippi 
to swim to the other side, assistance reaching him from the 
other bank when he was in the middle of the stream. Meanwhile 
the Indians, finding no further resistance, began to plunder. In 
their savaging they also seriously wounded a French dancing 
master by the name of Baby, who, on one of his regular tours of 
instruction, came riding along on a mule, which was too miser- 
able to save his master by running away from the savages.^^ 

The wounded negro, according to negro fashion, gave a very 
exaggerated account as to the number of Indians from which he 
had escaped, and so the German militia of the right bank was 
called out by D' Arensbourg ; but there being no means of trans- 
portation to get the men across the Mississippi in sufficient num- 
bers to cope with the enemies, reported to be so numerous, and 
the people fearing that, in the absence of the militia, the sav- 
ages might cross the Mississippi and begin a massacre among 
the unprotected women and children on the right side of the 
river, the militia was kept back and divided into three troops to 
protect the upper, middle, and lower right coast. At the same 
time a messenger was sent down to New Orleans for troops to 
go up on the left bank and engage the Indians while the militia 
should prevent the savages from crossing over. 

Instead of going to the aid of the Germans, however, Gov- 
ernor Vaudreuil went next day with twenty-two men to Bayou 
St. John, in the rear of New Orleans, to reinforce the soldiers 
already there and enable them to cut off the retreat of the In- 
dians, in which purpose he succeeded to the extent of killing 
two savages. Governor Vaudreuil should not have been sur- 
prised, as he seems to have been, at D'Arensbourg's not crossing 
the Mississippi with his militia, for he, as governor, must have 
known that there were no transportation facilities, which it was 
his duty as governor to provide, especially after the raid of 1747 
and previous ones, which always occurred on the left bank of 
the river. 

In the nineteenth century, the relations between the Ger- 



^ "Baby taught the ladies the minuet and the stately bows with which 
they were to salute the governor and his wife." Fortier, I, 131. 



62 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

mans and the Indians became very friendly. As late as 1845, 
thousands of Indians, following the migrating game, used to 
come from Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas to Louisiana, to 
spend the winter in the south. They were given quarters in the 
outhouses of the farmers, and spent their time in hunting and 
making baskets. Like the migrating swallows, these Indians 
for generations visited at the same farms and became well ac- 
quainted with the white families, and much attached to them. 
On their arrival, the red men kissed the white children, and on 
returning from their hunting trips, they never failed to give 
them choice pieces of their booty. Their departure for the 
north was always a source of deep regret to the white boys, 
some of whom used to accompany the Indians on their hunting 
trips, and learned much about hunting from them.^^ 

Better Times. 

In spite of all the hardships which the pioneers had to en- 
dure and the difficulties to be encountered, German energy, in- 
dustry, and perseverance conquered all; and although hundreds 
perished, the survivors wrested from the soil not only a bare 
living, but in course of time a high degree of prosperity also. 
Early travellers, who came down the Mississippi, describe the 
neat appearance of their little white houses, which stood in 
endless numbers on both banks of the Mississippi; and they also 
tell how these thrifty Germans used to row down to New Orleans 
in their boats with an abundance of their produce: vegetables, 
corn, rice, and later also indigo, to sell their goods on Sunday 
mornings in front of the cathedral; and how, at times, when 
non-producing New Orleans in vain waited for the provision 
ships from France or San Domingo, these German peasants more 
than once saved the city from heavy famine. Thus, in 1768, 
the provisions they furnished saved the Acadians. 

Churches of the Germans. 

In the Catholic church in New Orleans, on the site of the 
present St. Louis Cathedral, the first church in this part of the 

** Communicated by Felix Leche, Esq., a Creole of German descent. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 63 

colony of Louisiana, the Germans of the German Coast first 
attended divine service; here they also had their children christ- 
ened, here their weddings were celebrated. The cathedral rec- 
ords from 1720 to 1730 contain many German names.^^ 

But in 1724, so the census of that year informs us, the 
Germans had already a chapel of their own on the German Coast, 
which then may have stood already for one or two years, as 
the river settlement was made in the late fall of 1721. This 
chapel was built on the right bank of the Mississippi, on the 
place now called "Le Sassier" (Trinity Plantation), below Bon- 
net Carre Bend in St. Charles parish. ^^ It is interesting to 
note this fact and to remember that this chapel was built about 
the same time when the Jesuit Charlevoix reported (1722) that 
the people of New Orleans had "lent the Lord half of a miser- 
able store for divine service and that they want the Lord to 
move out again and accept shelter in a tent." Visiting priests 
from New Orleans held divine service on the German Coast 
until a resident priest was appointed. In the colonial budget 
for 1729 (earlier budgets are not available) provision was made 
for such a one. He was Pater Philip, a Capuchin. 

According to a map of the year 1731 (Crown Maps), the 
German settlement of that time began on the upper side of 
Bonnet Carre Bend, about four miles below Edgard, in St. 
John the Baptist parish, and extended from there down the 
Mississippi. But the map fails to show the German settlement 
on the other side of the river, where the census of 1724 places 
a number of Germans. 

The first chapel, according to tradition, was replaced in 
1740 by the first "Red Church" on the other side of the river, 
twenty-five miles above New Orleans. 

The first Red Church was burned in 1806, and in the same 
year replaced by the second, the present Red Church. An irre- 
parable loss was sustained here when, in 1877, a demented negro 
set fire to the priest's house, and all records of the church were 
burned. The rectory of the Red Church was not rebuilt. A 

^ See the author's Geschichte der deutschen Kirchengemeinden im Staate 
Louisiana, pages 11 to 17. 

^* Louisiana is the only state in the Union in which the word "parish" 
is used to designate a "county." 



64 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 



new parish was erected on the other side of the river, the Holy 
Rosary Church, where the parish priest of Red Church now 
resides. 




Church of St. Charles Borromaeus. 
"Red Church." 

The name "Red Church" is due to the traditional coat of 
red paint which both of these churches had and which made 
them a landmark for the boats on the Mississippi River. Nearby 
is the oldest existing cemetery of the Germans, with many beau- 
tiful tombs. One of them, that of the Rixner (originally "Rich- 
ner") family, is said to have cost ten thousand dollars. The 
tradition of the Rixner family about this tomb is that Geo. Rix- 
ner, who in 1839 married Amelie Ferret, had, in order to please 
his wife, to whom he was greatly devoted, laid aside ten thou- 
sand dollars to build a fine residence on his plantation. Before 
this could be done, the good wife died, and the sorrowing hus- 
band built his wife a magnificent tomb with this money. George 
Rixner never married again. His only child Amelie married 
an Italian, Count de Sarsana. She died in Marsala, Italy, and 
left a son, Ignatio. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 



65 



In 1 77 1, the Germans of the upper German Coast built the 
church of St. John the Baptist, in Edgard, upon the right side 
of the river, a few miles from the place where the first chapel 
had been. Fortunately, the records of this church have been 
preserved, and are in good condition. To that church the au- 
thor paid more than thirty visits, and there he gathered rich 
material for his work. 




Church of St. John the Baptist. i 

The corner stone of the present church of St. John the 
Baptist was laid on the 4th of June, 1820, and it was conse- 
crated on the 17th of March, 1822. It took the place of the 
first St. John the Baptist Church, erected about 1771. The rec- 
ords of the church begin in the year 1772 with the entry of the 
marriage of Anton Manz (now "Montz"), of the diocese of 
Strassburg, the son of Jos. M. and Anna Maria Laufer, who 
married Sibylla Bischof, daughter of Joseph Bischof and Anna 
Maria Raeser, of St. John. The Raeser family came to Louisi- 
ana in 1721. 

On account of the dampness of the ground, the dead are 



66 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

buried here in tombs above ground, and some very fine tombs 
belonging to the old colonial German families may be seen in 
this cemetery. About 1864, the portion of this parish on the 
opposite bank of the Mississippi was organized as the indepen- 
dent parish of St. Peter. The station "Reserve" of the Yazoo 
& Mississippi Valley Railway, thirty-five miles above New Or- 
leans, is about half a mile from this church. 

When, in 1769, the first church and cemetery of St. John 
were planned, there was some trouble to find the necessary 
ground for them. The Spanish General O'Reilly, hearing that 
some old bachelor had more land, twelve arpents, than he could 
attend to ordered him to furnish the necessary ground for both 
church and cemetery. To compensate him for his loss, the com- 
munity was commanded to clear for him the same number of 
arpents on the remaining land of the man, and to give him the 
same number of new pickets as he had lost with the church land. 
This order was signed on the 21st of February, 1770. The 
original is still to be seen in the court house at Edgard. 

Situation: The church of St. John the Baptist is imme- 
diately behind the levee, St. John the Baptist parish, Louisiana, 
two miles from St. John station of the Texas & Pacific Rail- 
way, thirty-five miles by rail above New Orleans. The post 
office on the place is called "Edgard." 

The first parish priest (1772) was Pater Bernhard von 
Limbach, a German Capuchin, who later was transferred to 
St. Louis, Missouri. 

The Census of 1721. 

The Louisiana Historical Society received from Paris, in 
December, 1904, a copy of the census taken by M. Diron, In- 
spector General of the French troops in Louisiana and signed by 
him, Bienville, Le Blond de la Tour, Duvergier, and de Cormes, 
on the 24th of November, 1721. 

If this were a complete census of Louisiana, we would have 
an accurate description of the state of affairs on John Law's 
concession on the Arkansas River at the time when the German 
Law people were there ; and also an accurate account of the two 
old German villages on the German Coast, which were flooded 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 67 

by the great hurricane of 1721. Unfortunately, however, it 
covers only New Orleans and vicinity, from below English Turn 
to Cannes Brulees.^^ 

As a matter of general interest, it may be stated from this 
census that the white population of New Orleans in 1721 con- 
sisted of : 

y2 civilians, of whom 40 were married and had 29 children, 
44 soldiers, " " 14 " " " " no 

II officers, " " 2 " " " " one child each, 

22 ship captains and 

sailors, 9 " " " " 7 children, 

28 European laborers {engages) The names of the ^n^ra^^^ are 

never given, neither is it 
stated whether or not they 
were married. The church 
records show that some of 
them were married. 
There were also : 
177 negro slaves, 
21 Indian slaves, 
36 cows, and 
9 horses. 

Only nine horses in the whole town ! Not even the governor 
of the colony of Louisiana could boast of a horse, and the cannon 
and the ammunition for the troops must have been drawn either 
by the soldiers themselves, or by negroes or cows, for the nine 
horses were private property. Trudeau had four of them, and 
Pierre and Mathurin Dreux owned the other five. 

Furthermore, in eleven years, from 1721 to 1732, the number 
of horses increased only from nine to fourteen! Dr. Manade, of 
Chartres street, had two horses in 1732; the butcher Caron, of 
Chartres street, owned one ; the blacksmith Botson, the interpreter 
Duparc, and the concessioner Bruslees, all of St. Anne street, had 
one each; Dr. Alexander, of the hospital, owned one; clerk of 
the court Rossard, of Toulouse street, had three; and M. Mar- 
baud, of Bourbon street, had four. 

Judging from the family names the whole population of 
New Orleans was French in 1721, but there lived also one Ger- 

^ Cannes Brulees was on the left bank of the Mississippi, six lieues or 
eighteen miles (by river) above New Orleans and immediately below the 
German Coast. 



68 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

man family in New Orleans : "Johann Gustav Freitag, wife and 
child". 

The town limits of New Orleans were then the river front, 
Dauphine, Ursuline and Bienville streets. At a later time "Chapi- 
toulas Gate" was built at the upper end of the town, out of which 
ran the only road leading along the river up the coast, the "Chapi- 
toulas Road". 

All the land from the upper side of Bienville street up to the 
present "Southport", above Carrollton (Nine Mile Point), and 
from the Mississippi back to the present Claiborne avenue — 213 
1/2 arpents river front — belonged to Governor Bienville, who, 
after selecting the site for the future city of New Orleans in 
1 71 8, hastened to lay hold of as much as possible of the best 
land, adjacent to the coming city, and caused ^^ the Superior 
Council of Louisiana to grant him this land immediately above 
New Orleans, as a concession, and to give him also a second con- 
cession of 112 arpents front on the other side of the Mississippi, 
beginning below the point of Algiers, "Pointe Saint Antoine", 
near the present Vallette street, and extending down the Missis- 
sippi. 

After these two grants had been made by the Superior 
Council of Louisiana, on the 27th of March, 1719,^^ and while 
the matter was still pending before the directors of the Com- 
pagnie des Lides in Paris for their approval, a royal edict was 
issued on the 7th of November, 1719,^^ forbidding governors, 
lieutenant-governors, and intendants (Hubert, the intendant, had 
a fine concession in Natchez and another opposite New Orleans) 
to own plantations. They were allowed to have "vegetable gar- 
dens" only. 

Notwithstanding this royal edict, Bienville, who had already 
received Horn Island in socage tenure, ^^ had these two immense 
new grants approved by the directors in Paris on February 6th, 
J ►,20.30 



" That Bienville himself demanded these grants from the company is 
shown by the wording of the official documents. "Sur la demande de Mon- 
sieur de Bienville," and again : "le terrain que vous avez choisy." Pages 12 
and 20, Concessions, New Transcripts of the La. Hist. Soc. 

" Volume Concessions, page 18. 

" Fortier's History of Louisiana, I, 83. 

** Grace King's Bienville, page 238. 

" Volume Concessions, page 18. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 69 

In order to obey the letter, if not the spirit, of the royal 
edict, Bienville now designated 53 1/2 out of 213 1/2 arpents 
immediately above New Orleans as his habitation, "the vegetable 
garden", which extended from Bienville street to near our Fe- 
licity Road, and from the Mississippi to our Claiborne avenue — 
a pretty good sized "vegetable garden" — comprising more than 
the whole first district of the present city of New Orleans. 

Not satisfied with this, Bienville made a second "vegetable 
garden" by taking forty-nine arpents front by a depth of eighty 
arpents of his grant on the other side of the river and designating 
this also as his habitation.^^ 

And as he was not allowed to work the remainder of his 
two big grants as plantations, he conceived the plan of intro- 
ducing into Louisiana a system of feudal tenure, selling these 
lands to people for very burdensome annual ground rent in money 
and products, and also in manual labor. 

Some of Bienville's first victims were twelve German fami- 
lies, storm victims, whom he placed on his lands above "the vege- 
table garden" above New Orleans, about January ist, 1723, but 
who soon tired of enjoying the benevolent arrangements of "The 
Father of the Colony", and left for other parts of Louisiana.^^ 

On Bienville's land between Bienville street and Southport 
only one family lived in 1721. This was M. de Baume, attorney 
general of the colony at the time when the two grants were made 
to Bienville. He had six arpents front beyond the upper limit of 
"the vegetable garden", where he resided with his wife and two 
children. He had three engages, nine negro slaves, five cows, 
and two horses. 

In 1722 Bienville came to New Orleans and established him- 
self on his land where he occupied the square bounded by Bien- 
ville, Iberville, Decatur and Chartres streets.^^ The square 
behind, bounded by Bienville, Iberville, Chartres and Royal 
streets, he sold, together with other lands, in 1726, to the Jesuit 

"Volume Concessions, page 448. The people settled by Bienville on 
his Algiers' grant were all Canadians. Among them were three by the name 
of "Langlois." 

^They went up to the German Coast. 

"In a map of 1728 (see U. S. Census of 1880) this square is marked: 
"Terre concedee a Mr. de Bienville," and the square behind as : "Terrain aux 
Jesuites." 



70 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

fathers, who, on the first of May, 1728, purchased another five 
arpents from him and gradually acquired the whole territory up 
to Felicity Road. The original Jesuits' plantation therefore began 
on Bienville street and not on Common street, as the legend says. 
Common street may have been the lower boundary at a later time, 
when it became necessary to use the ground from Bienville street 
to Canal street for the purpose of fortifying the town. This was 
after 1729, after the great massacre in Fort Rosalie. 

Where Southport now stands, in the center of the great bend 
of the Mississippi above Carrollton, began "le village des Chapi- 
toulas". Hence "Chapitoulas Gate" in New Orleans, "Chapitou- 
las Road" and our present "Tchoupitoulas street". 

In Chapitoulas were the great plantations of Deubreuol, 
Chauvin de Lery, Chauvin la Freniere, and Chauvin Beaulieu, 
all Canadians. There was also, away from the river front, and 
two miles below Cannes Briilees (Kenner), the so-called "Koly" 
concession. According to the census of 1721, there were on this 
place sixty-two white men, twelve white women with five children, 
forty-four negro slaves, two Indian slaves, five head of cattle, 
and four horses. The census says that on this place six hundred 
quarts of rice were made from fourteen quarts of seed rice. 

There was a second so-called "Koly" plantation in Louisiana 
in 1 72 1, called St. Catharine plantation, originally Hubert's con- 
cession, on which were, in 1723, forty-three white men, six white 
women with two children, forty-five negro slaves, two Indian 
slaves, fifty-two head of cattle, and two horses. These were, 
evidently, part of the same people who were moved to St. Cathe- 
rine when the first "Koly" plantation was abandoned. 

The "Koly" estate also owned a large house in New Orleans, 
on Chartres street, in which six Ursuline nuns lived with six 
boarding scholars and twenty-eight orphan girls. This house 
was later bought for a hospital, a sailor named Jean Louis having 
left a legacy of 10,000 livres for that purpose. This was the 
beginning of the "Charity Hospital" of Ncav Orleans. 

KOLY. 

All Louisiana historians merely refer to Koly as a Swiss. 
This is all they say about him. But in a volume of the New 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 71 

Transcripts of the Louisiana Historical Society the author 
found information which throws more light upon him. 

This volume contains a large number of official documents 
relating to the "Concession St. Catherine" ; and in these papers, 
which do not state that Koly was a Swiss, "Jean Daniel Koly" 
is called "Councilor of the Financial Council of His Highness 
the Elector of Bavaria" (Elector Max Emanuel, who ruled from 
1679 to 1726). 

It appears from these documents that in 171 8 an associa- 
tion was formed in Paris, of which Koly and the banker Deucher 
of Paris seem to have been the leading spirits. Among its mem- 
bers were several French officials of high rank, and also "Jean 
Le Chambrier escuyer Envoye de Sa Majeste le Roy de Prusse 
a la Cour de France." The association had a capital of 400,000 
livres, and, on the nth of December, 1719, received from the 
Compagnie des Indes a land concession in Louisiana of four 
leagues square, the location of which was to be decided by the 
association. 

On the 29th of December, 1719, Koly and Deucher, in 
the name of their associates, entered into a contract with Faucon 
Dumanoir, engaging him for a term of eight years as the director 
general of the association, with instructions to proceed with the 
necessary number of officials and engages to Louisiana and 
there to select and manage the lands of the association. The 
principal plantation was to be called "St. Catherine," smaller 
posts to be named by the director general. 

Dumanoir embarked on the 28th of May, 1720, on board the 
ship St. Andre at L'Orient, and arrived in Biloxi on the 24th 
of the following August with eleven officers, 186 workmen, 
twenty-three women, and six children. According to the names 
on the passenger list, only a few Germans seem to have been 
among them : Jean Bierzel and Jean Mayeur. Among the French 
workmen of this concession was Frangois Forestier of St. Malo, 
a locksmith (serrurier) who later became "armurier," i. e., keeper 
of the armory of the king. Frangois Forestier was the progen- 
itor of the "Fortier" family in Louisiana. 

In a letter dated Natchez, July i8th, 1721, Dumanoir de- 
scribes his experiences on the voyage and in Biloxi. The Compag- 
nie des Indes had engaged itself to transport gratis to Louisiana 



72 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

the men and belongings of the association, and to feed officers and 
men, the first named at the captain's table and the latter with 
sailors' rations, not only during the sea voyage but also until 
they should arrive at their concession. The food furnished on 
board was of such bad quality, that Dumanoir had to give his 
people of his own provisions, which he had taken with him for 
his concession to bridge over the time until the first crop could 
be made on the new concession; and, finally the company took 
forcibly from him more than four months' provisions and twenty- 
eight out of thirty-one large casks of wine. "This is the cause," 
Dumanoir complains in his letter, "why I have not drunk any wine 
for the last three months." 

In Biloxi he found no sheds to store his goods, nor a hos- 
pital, and not even medicines for his sick. Ninety of his people 
died there of the fever which raged in Biloxi "for four years." 
There were no boats to take his men to the Mississippi, and they 
had to stay nearly eight months on the sandy shore. He himself 
built two barges in which he set off on the 23rd of April, 1721, 
with part of his men with whom he reached Natchez about 
the end of June. The rest of his people had to remain behind. 
Another authority says that they stayed in Biloxi for a whole 
year, 

Dumanoir then had hardly enough provisions left to last 
for two months, which, together with the great loss of time, 
made it impossible for him to go into the wilderness and select 
a site for the new plantation. So Dumanoir, in January, 1721, 
bought Hubert's plantation in Natchez for 50,000 livres, and 
also twelve cows and two negroes from M. Raquet for 6,500 
livres. 

This was the best he could do under the circumstances, but 
his right to select four leagues square as a concession for his 
association was lost. Hubert's place offered many advantages. 
At Natchez there was a military post to furnish protection against 
the Indians, and there were already 160 arpents cleared which 
saved fifteen months of time, work, salaries, and other expenses. 
Moreover, the seed was in the ground for a large crop of pro- 
visions and tobacco. To satisfy immediate wants, however, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 73 

Dumanoir purchased another place, a little concession, the same 
mentioned under "Chapitoulas" in the census of 1721, which 
was later abandoned. 

In 1727 charges of maladministration were made against 
Dumanoir, and he was deposed. It must have been then that 
Koly determined to come to Louisiana himself to take charge 
of the enterprise. He and his son were killed by the Natchez 
Indians in St. Catharine in the great massacre in 1729. 

Continuation of the Census of 1721. 

The upper part of Chapitoulas was later called "La Provi- 
dence," and extended to Cannes Brulees, where M, Diron, the 
inspector general, had his concession. At this point the census 
of 1 72 1 stops. 

Seven lieues below New Orleans is English Turn. Imme- 
diately below this was at that time the second concession, the 
principal one being on the Yazoo River, of M. le Blanc, the 
French minister of war, and adjoining this was John Law's 
second concession, his principal one being on the Arkansas River. 
On this, the lower concession of Law, were, in 1721, five men, 
eleven women, fourteen children, and forty engages. We have 
learned that all the Law people were Germans, and so we have 
a settlement of seventy Germans, in 1721, below English Turn. 

This is all the information concerning the early Germans 
contained in the official census of 1721. 

Remarks and Observations on Louisiana. 
There are some fifteen pages of "Remarks and Observa- 
tions on Louisiana," probably written by some reviewing official, 
attached to the census of 1721. These "R. & O.," as they will 
be indicated hereafter, bear no signature, nor is the first part, 
referring to lower Louisiana, dated. The second part, dealing 
with the Illinois district, is dated "in March, 1722." The second 
part was, therefore, written much later than the official census 
report; and the first part, too, can not have been written earlier 
than February, 1722, because it mentions the exodus of the 
Germans from the Arkansas River as an historical ev»nt, al- 
though it did not take place earlier than February, 1722. 



74 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Of the Germans on the German Coast "R. & O." say that 
"they may be composed of about 330 persons of both sexes and 
of all ages." 

We are also told that there were then still eighty German 
people left on the Arkansas River. As La Harpe found only 
forty-seven Germans there on his arrival, on the 20th of March, 
1722, "R. & O." must have been w^ritten after the removal of 
the people from there had begun and before it was completed. 

"R. & O." AND THE Census Reports. 

February, 1722, "R. & O." Estimate of population of Ger- 
man Coast, 330 persons. 

May 15th, 1722, Official census of German Coast: 

Karlstein =r DArensbourg and an orphan boy 2 persons, 

Mariental = 26 men, 30 women, 26 children 82 persons, 

Hoffen = 25 men, 29 women, 49 children 103 persons, 

Augsburg = 17 men, 20 women, 33 children 70 persons. 

69 men, 79 women, 109 children 257 persons. 

The census of 1722, which is really a continuation of that 
of 1 72 1, covers the territory from Cannes Brulees to the village 
of the Tounicas, and the whole right bank besides. On the 
right bank, two lieues above New Orleans, at a place called "Le 
Petit Desert" (near Westwego) three German families are men- 
tioned : three men, three women and seven children, who are not 
included here as residents of the German Coast. 
November, 1724. Official census : 

German Coast — 53 men, 57 women, 59 children, in all 169 
persons. 
1 73 1. Official Census : 

German Coast — 42 men, 44 women, 88 children, in all 174 
persons. 

There is a great discrepancy between the figures of the 
writer of "R. & O." and those of the census of 1722, although 
there were scarcely three months time between them : 

330 given by "R. & O.," against 257 enumerated in the 
census. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 75 

Although the mortaHty among these Germans was very- 
great, as we can see by comparing the official data of the differ- 
ent years enumerated above, this alone would not explain the 
difference between the estimate of "R. & O." and that of the 
census of 1722. There must have been some other cause. 

And there was. There was an exodus, of which the official 
census of 1722, enumerating only those actually present on the 
day of enumeration, did not take notice, but which is mentioned 
in other official documents. 

On the first of December, 1722, Governor Bienville wrote 
to the Superior Council that he intended to place from twelve to 
fifteen German families upon his land between New Orleans 
and Chapitoulas, and he specifies : 

"Of those Germans who lost their subsistance by the great hur- 
ricane and are now compelled to seek employment in order to pro- 
vide for their families". 

He would not enter into contracts with them, however, with- 
out the consent of the Superior Council. Ten days afterwards 
the council approved these contracts 

"With the Germans who have engaged themselves to begin a 
new establishment on account of the bad situation and the difficul- 
ties they encountered on the lands which they occupied 'aux Ten- 
sas ^ . 

"Le village des Tensas"^'* was part of the German Coast, 
known as the concession of M. De Meure. This De Meure, in 
1 72 1, sold the whole river front of his grant (four lieues square) 
to La Harpe, leaving a passage of only three arpents from the 
river front to the land in the rear, which latter he retained. The 
front lands were then taken up by the Germans. ^^ 

This correspondence between Bienville and the Superior 
Council proves that there was an exodus, and also establishes 
the fact that a number of Germans, who had been habitants were 



^^The Tensas Indians were removed, in 1714, to Mobile County, because 
the Oumas constantly and habitually waged a relentless war against them. 

^As La Harpe also appears in March, 1722, on the Arkansas river, depos- 
ing Levens, the agent of John Law, taking the inventory, and placing Dude- 
maine Dufresne in charge, he seems to have acted in these transactions under 
the authority of the Compagnie des Indes. 



76 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

compelled to become engages. It also explains the apparent dis- 
crepancy between the estimate of "R. & O." and the census of 
1722. The writer of "R. & O." did not know that so many 
storm victims had left their places to become engages, and the 
census enumerator took cognizance only of those present on the 
day of enumeration. 

The great mortality mentioned before appears when the 
census reports for 1722 and 1724 are compared. In these two 
years the number of the men decreased from 69 to 53, the women 
from 79 to 57, and the children from 108 to 59. Then came 
a change. The adults, not being reinforced by new immigra- 
tion, continued to decrease in numbers, while the number of 
children born in the colony rose from 59 to 88, more than 
making up for the loss of grown people. We may well assume 
that from that year on the population of the German Coast con- 
tinued to increase. 

In connection with the census of 1731 an important fact must 
be mentioned. The large concessions granted in former years in 
Louisiana had not proved advantageous to the colony. Many 
concessioners did not come to Louisiana at all, holding their 
grants only for speculation. Others had not the means to im- 
prove them, and still others abandoned them after experimenting 
on the ground with insufficient capital, and experiencing all kinds 
of difficulties, and because of the unwise administration of the 
colony. So the. Superior Council petitioned the king to cancel 
all concessions between Manchac and the gulf, in order that a 
readjustment could be had. 

This cancellation was done by an edict issued on the loth 
of August, 1728; and even Bienville, who in the preceding year 
had sold to the Jesuits some of his land above New Orleans, lost 
his concessions, although in his brief of remonstrance he cited 
the placing of twelve German families on that land as an evi- 
dence that he had tried to improve it. 

Many lands, especially on the left l)ank of the Mississippi, 
opposite the German villages, were now open to hona fide settlers, 
and many changes in the occupants of the land occurred. Am- 
bros Heidel, the progenitor of all the "Haydel" families in Louis- 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana yy 

iana, crossed the Mississippi and settled on the left bank. So 
did his old neighbor Caspar Dubs, the progenitor of all the 
"Toups" families, and so did Nikolaus Wichner, the progenitor 
of the "Vicners," "Vicnaires," and "Vickners," while all those 
German families who had settled on Bienville's lands between 
New Orleans and Chapitoulas, the storm victims, also went fur- 
ther up the river to live among their compatriots. 

Names of German Habitants on Both Banks of the 
Mississippi Above New Orleans. 

Official Census of 1724. 

The official census taken in November, 1724, must always be 
the principal source of information concerning the founders of the 
German Coast in Louisiana. It will, therefore, be treated here 
at some length ; and such notes will be added to it as were taken 
from other census reports, from church registers, and other 
official sources. 

The official census of 1724 embraces the concessions and 
habitations on both sides of the Mississippi River from New 
Orleans to and -including the German Coast. It consists of two 
parts of sixty entries each. The first part covers the right bank 
from the upper limits of the German villages (upper side of 
Bonnet Carre bend) down to a point nearly opposite New Or- 
leans ; and the second part begins at the upper town limit of New 
Orleans on the left bank (at what is now Bienville street) and 
follows the left bank up the river to a point ten lieues above 
and opposite the German villages, where the first part began. 

Concerning the spelling of the German family names the 
reader is referred to the section of this work on the changes 
German names suffered at the hands of the French officials. 
Having met these names in many official records and church 
registers, and having found the same names spelt differently 
by many officials, and having also found original signatures of 
the German people, the author was in many instances able to 
restore the original German names. Where this was not pos- 
sible, a question mark follows the name here. 



John Lav\S 
Concess'o 



THtPRIHClPAL FORTS AMD TRADING PC 

\BTV1. CtWTURY. 

BY 
J. HAWNO DL\LtR. 



ArkansQi Posi ^ 
1655 




La Salle - ^ /, v>' 
Apnl 9fh.\6eZ /) ^.\l^ 



Iberv'Me.t^arch Znd. I&e9 
O 



G vi 14^ 






\ 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 79 

As to the names of the birthplaces, also, a few words of 
explanation are needed. As the German people pronounced these 
names usually in their home dialect, the French officials were 
entirely at sea as to their correct forms, and wrote them down 
so that, in many cases, they cannot be recognized. Many people 
also came from little hamlets the names of which are not to be 
found even in such works as Neumann's "Orts- und Verkehrs- 
Lexikon," which contains 75,000 names of places in the Ger- 
man empire, and gives the names of all places of 300 and more 
inhabitants. 

Of frequent occurrence in this census, and of special im- 
portance, are the names "Palatinate" (Pfalz), "Mayence" 
(Mainz), and "Spire" (Speyer). The Palatinate of the 
eighteenth century was much larger than the present Palatinate. 
It included the northern portions of Baden and Wurtemberg, 
extending nearly to the towns of Heilbronn and Wimpf<^n, and 
the Elector Palatinate resided then in Heidelberg. Accord- 
ingly, some places given in this census as belonging to the Pala- 
tinate may now have to be looked for in Baden and Wurtemberg. 

The name "Spire" may signify the city of Spire and the 
small territory that belonged to the bishop of Spire. But if 
Spire means the diocese of Spire, then the whole Palatinate is 
included. The bishop of Spire at that time resided alternately 
in Spire and Durlach. 

The name "Mayence" may mean the city of Mayence; it 
may mean the electorate of Mayence, a much larger territory, 
and it may mean the archdiocese of Mayence. The last included, 
also, the whole of Franconia, with the dioceses of Wuerzburg 
and Bamberg, which now belong to Bavaria. 

Of the names of the three German villages, "Hoffen," 
"Mariental," and "Augsburg," on the German Coast of Loui- 
siana, and mentioned in the census of 1724, two, Hoffen and 
Augsburg, occurred before in the passenger lists of the four 
pest ships which sailed from L'Orient, in France, on the twenty- 
fourth of January, 1721. They were used in the passenger lists 
to indicate the parish of birth of some of the emigrants. 



8o The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Right Bank of the Mississippi. 

The German Village of Hoffen, lo Lieues Above New Orleans. 
November 12th, 1724. 

Simon Lambert is mentioned as "premier habitant et le plus 
haut sur le fleuve," the habitant living highest up on the right 
bank of the Mississippi. This location w^as on the upper side of 
Bonnet Carre Bend, about four miles below Edgard in the parish 
of St. John the Baptist. Lambert's habitation bears the number 
one. Thence the census enumerator proceeded down the right 
side of the river. 

1. Simon Lambert, of Oberebesheim, diocese of Spire, Catholic; 

40 years of age. His wife; and a son, 18 years of age. Five 
arpents cleared. Gave up his first place on account of inunda- 
tion. 

1726 : Six arpents cleared. 

1731 : Occupant of this place, Jean Martin Lambert, son 

of the aforementioned, with wife and child. 
1764: Bartholomew Lambert, son of Jean Martin Lambert 
and Anna Eve Lambert, married Margarethe Troxler, 
daughter of Geo. T. and Marie Agnes Troxler. 

2. Conrad Friedrich, of Rothenberg, diocese of Spire. (There is 

one Rothenberg east of Mannheim.) Catholic; 50 years old. 
His wife and three children. A daughter of 18 years; the 
youngest child five years old. Gave up first place on account of 
inundation. "A good worker". 
1726: Six arpents cleared. 

1726: Daughter Anna Barbara married Friedrich Merkel 
from Wurtemberg, and, after whose death she mar- 
ried Nikolaus Wichner. Nikolaus Wichner and Anna 
Barbara Friedrich were the progenitors of most of the 
"Vicners", "Vicnaires" and "Vickners". 
1728: Daughter Anna Maria married Edw. Poupart, of 

Paris. 
1731 : One child at home. Two negroes; one cow. 
About 1750 Sebastian Friedrich, son of Conrad Friedrich, 
married Regina Heidel (Haydel), daughter of Ambros 
Heidel, of St. John the Baptist. They lived below New 
Orleans. 

3. Johann Georg Troxler, of Lichtenberg in Alsace. Catholic; 26 

years old. A mason. His wife. "Fort bon travailleur". Two 
and one-half arpents cleared, on which he has been only since 
the beginning of the year having left the village in the rear. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 8i 

Exposed to inundation. Absent because of bad health. His 
wife is also sick. Lost his crop and his house. A neighbor, who 
cooked in a shed attached to Troxler's house, accidentally set fire 
to it. 

1 731: Two children. Two negroes; one cow. 

Johann Georg Troxler was the progenitor of all the "Trox- 
ler" and "Trosclair" families in Louisiana. 

4. Johann Georg Bock, from the neighborhood of Fort Kehl in 
Baden. Catholic; 38 years old; weaver. His wife with child 
at the breast. One and a half arpents cleared. Two years on 
the place. 

1729: Marie Francoise, daughter of J. G. Bock and Cath. 

Hislinger, baptized. 
1731 : Three children. One negro. 

Now come the two tracts of land abandoned by Lambert and 
Friedrich. 

5. Wilhelm Ziriac, also "Querjac", "Siriaque", and "Siriac", of 
Ilmenstadt, near Mayence. Formerly coachman to King Stanis- 
laus. Catholic; 50 years old. His wife and daughter, seven 
years old. Two and a half arpents cleared. Two years on the 
place. "One of the more well to do people of the community. 
A good worker." 

1731 : Only husband and wife mentioned. His daughter 
became the first wife of Ludwig Wiltz, the progenitor 
of the New Orleans branch of the Wiltz family, which 
is now extinct in the male line. All of the name of 
Wiltz now living belong to the Mobile branch of the 
family. 

6. Johann Callander, of Aubrequin (Ober ... ?), Palatinate. 
Catholic; 26 years old. His wife. A daughter. Sister-in-law; 
mother-in-law. One year on the place. Six arpents cleared, 
two and a half of which he bought from Peter Schmitz, and 
two and a half of which belonged to his mother-in-law and his 
children. 

1731 : One child. One negro; one cow. 

7. Stephan Kistenmacher, of Cologne. Catholic; 39 years old. 
His wife and a daughter of 10 years. One and a half arpents 
cleared. Two years on the place. "Sick, broken down, miser- 
able." 

1728: His daughter Margarethe married Louis Leonhard, 

from the Arkansas post. 
1731 : Husband, wife and child. One engage. One negro; 

one cow. 



82 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

8. Jeremias Wagner, of Orensburg ( ?) in the marquisate of Ans- 
bach (Bavaria). Lutheran ; 27 years of age. Hunter, His wife 
with a child at the breast. Sister-in-law. Two arpents cleared. 
One year on the place. "Very good man and a great hograiser". 

1726: Six arpents cleared. 

9. Leonhard Magdolff, of Hermnnse ( ?), Wurtemberg. Catholic; 
45 years old. His wife. An adopted orphan boy, 10 years old. 
Two and a half arpents cleared. One year on the place. "A 
good worker. Has a very fine garden, is well lodged, and very 
prosperous in his affairs." 

1726: Six arpents cleared. 

1731 : No children. Three cows. 

10. Andreas Schantz (Chance), of Hochhausen, Franconia. Catho- 
lic; 25 years old. Miller. His wife with a child at the breast. 
Stepdaughter of 15 years. "A good man, well lodged." Has a 
cow from the company and a calf of eight days. A big hog 
and two little pigs. 

1726: Andreas Schantz married Maria Magdalena GafTel, 

daughter of Leonhard G. and Cath. Wolf. 
1731 : Two children. Four negroes; four cows. 

11. Johann Georg Bets, of Weibstadt, diocese of Spire. Catho- 

lic; 32 years old. Butcher and prevot. His wife with a child 
at the breast. An orphan girl, nine years of age. Three arpents 
cleared. Three years on the place. A cow, a calf, and two 
pigs. 

1727: On the first of July, 1727, Betz, his wife, and two 
children are reported as inmates of the hospital in New 
Orleans, and on the 24th of August Betz died. His 
widow, who was a sister of Ambros Heidel (Haydel), 
then married Caspar Diehl of Alsace. The whole 
family, Diehl, his wife, two children, "a brother" 
(whose brother?) were murdered in 1729 by the Nat- 
chez Indians in the great massacre in Natchez. 

12. Johann Adam Matern, of Rosenheim, in Upper Alsace. Catho- 
lic ; 26 years old. Weaver. His wife with a child at the breast ; 
two sisters-in-law, 18 and 20 years of age. One and a half 
year on the place. Two and a half arpents cleared. "A good 
worker", who deserves some negroes. Three pigs. 

1731 : Three children. Three negroes; seven cows. 

13. Caspar Dubs (Toups) from the neighborhood of Zurich, Switz- 
erland. Protestant; 40 years of age. Butcher and prevot. 
His wife; two boys, 10 and 12 years old. Two years on the 
place. One and a half arpents cleared. Three pigs. 

1728: Caspar Dubs married Maria Barbara Kittler, from 
Wurtemberg. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 83 

1731 : Six arpents cleared. 

Caspar Dubs was the progenitor of all the Toups families 
in Louisiana. 

14. Ambros Heidel (Haydel), of Neukirchen, electorate of May- 
ence. Catholic; 22 years old. Baker. His wife; his brother, 
18 years old; his brother-in-law, aged 13, crippled. One and 
a half year on the place. "Good worker, very much at ease." 
One pig. 

Ambros Heidel's younger brother is mentioned for the last 
time in 1727. It is possible that he was murdered by 
the Natchez Indians with the family of his sister. See 
No. II. From the entry there it does not appear 
whether the brother murdered was the husband's or 
the wife's brother. 

1731 : Ambros Heidel, wife, two children. One engage. 
Three negroes and two cows. 

15. Jacob Ritter, of Lustuen in Wurtemberg (Lustnau near Tubin- 
gen?). Catholic; 28 years old. Shoemaker. His wife. One 
and a half arpents cleared. Six months on the place. One 

pig- 

1726 : Four arpents cleared. 
1731 : Two cows. 

16. Michael Vogel, of Altdorf, Suevia, Germany. Catholic; 40 
years old. Cooper. A little hard of hearing. Son of two 
years, daughter of eleven years in New Orleans. Sixteen 
verges cleared. (Ten verges=one arpent.) Two years on the 
place. One pig. 

1726 : Four arpents cleared. 

1726: Margarethe Vogel, his daughter, married Jean Bos- 
sier, farmer from Natchitoches. 
1731 : Two children. One negro; two cows. 

17. Sebastian Funck, of Hagenau, Alsace. Catholic; 30 years old. 
His wife. Child of one year; orphan girl of 16 years. Two 
years on the place. Five arpents cleared, which he bought from 
two Germans, of whom one went to Natchitoches, while the 
other took land from Governor Bienville near New Orleans, 
which he has now held two years. One pig. 

1726: Husband, wife, two children. Four arpents cleared. 

18. Michael Horn, of Limbal, near Mayence. Catholic; 39 years 
old. His wife and a daughter of eight years. Fifteen verges 
cleared. Fifteen days on the place. Came from "the old vil- 
lage". His sickness prevents him from succeeding. Michael 
Horn's daughter married Louis Toups. 

1726 : Four arpents cleared. 

19. A strip of land of eight verges for the surgeon of the com- 
munity. A hut on it. Abandoned. 



84 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Here ends the village of Hoffen, and the census man now 
leaves the river front and proceeds to the two old villages in the 
rear, which were mentioned before. 

Old German Village {i. e., the "second" one. See before.)- 
Three-fourths of a mile from the Mississippi. 

20. Balthasar Monthe, of Troppau, in Silesia, Germany. Catholic; 
42 years old. His wife. Daughter of 13 months. One and a 
fifth arpents cleared. Three years on the place. "A good 
worker. Everything well arranged on his place. Was sick 
the whole summer." Two pigs. He died in 1727. 

21. Johann Georg Raeser, of Biebrich, in the electorate of 

Mayence. Catholic; 32 years old. Blacksmith. His wife. An 
orphan girl of 18 years. Two arpents cleared. Three years on 
the place. "Well arranged. Good worker." 

1726: Husband, wife, three children, brother-in-law. Six 
arpents cleared. One pig. 

1731 : Husband, wife, one child. 

22. Johann Jacob Bebloquet (?) oi hamberloch, Aha.ce. Lutheran; 
36 years old. Hunter. His wife. Three children, two boys 
and one girl, ranging from two to thirteen years of age. One 
and a half arpents cleared. Three years on the place. Two pigs. 
"Well arranged. Good worker." 

23. Johann Cretzmann (Kretzmann), of canton Berne, Switzer- 
land. Calvinist; 46 years old. His wife; son of five years. 
One and a half arpents cleared. "His affairs well regulated. 
Demands his passage." Did not get it. 

1726: As widower of Barbara Hostmann, Johann Cretz- 
mann married Susanna Rommel (Rome), daughter 
of Heinrich Rommel, and sister of Johann Rommel. 
See No. 26. 

1731 : Husband; wife; three children. Six arpents cleared. 

24. Balthasar Marx, of Wullenberg, Palatinate (one Wollenberg 
near Wimpfen), Catholic; 2y years old. Nailsmith. His wife, 
22 years old. "His wife had a miscarriage last year on account 
of working at the pounding trough ('pilon'). He went to New 
Orleans to get some salt and had to give a barrel of shelled rice 
for three pounds. His affairs excellently arranged. Good 
worker." One and a half arpents cleared. Three years on the 
place. 

173 1 : Husband, wife, two children. One engage. One 

negro ; three cows. 
1775 : Jean Simon Marx, son of Balthasar and Marianne 

Aglae Marx, married Cath. Troxler, daughter of Nik. 

T. and Cath. Matern (St. James parish). 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 85 

25 Bernard Wich, of Tainlach, in Wurtemberg. Lutheran; 46 
years old. His wife. Three children, a boy and two girls, 
from 13 years down to two months. Two arpents cleared. A 

pig- 

1731 : Two children. One engage. One negro. 

26. Johann Rommel (now Rome), of Kinhart, Palatinate. Catho- 
lic; 24 years of age. Tailor. His wife. One and a half ar- 
pents cleared. Three years on the place. A pig. 
1728: Jean Rommel baptized. 
1731 : Three children. Two cows. 

2^. Catharine Weller (ine), 49 years old, from Heilbronn, Wur- 
temberg, widow of August Paul, a Lutheran, a tailor. "Expects 
a child. Alone and poor. Has no provisions and needs some 
assistance. Six verges cleared." 

28. Anna Kuhn, widow of Johann Adam Zweig (Labranche). Her 
husband was a Catholic, and died in Biloxi. Daughter of twelve 
years. One and a half arpents cleared. "Has no provisions 
and no seed for the next year. Needs some assistance." 

1729 : Daughter Anna Margarethe Zweig married Pierre 
Bridel, a soldier, and a native of Bretagne. According 
to the marriage entry the bride was born in Bollweiler, 
Alsace. 

29. Magdalena Fromberger, 50 years old. Catholic; widow of 
George Meyer from Ingitippil (?), Suevia, Germany. "Her 
son, Nik. Mayer, is crippled but industrious in the cooper trade. 
He also makes galoches which are a great help when shoes are 
scarce. An orphan girl, 20 years old. One and a half arpents 
cleared. Three years on the place. A pig. 

1731 : Nik. Meyer. His wife and a child. One engage. 
Two negroes ; two cows. 

30. Margarethe Reynard (Reinhard?), from Bauerbach, Baden. 
Catholic; 46 years old. Separated from Johann Leuck (?), 
who lives on the Mississippi. Daughter from first marriage, 
aged seven years. Seven verges cleared. Three years on the 
place. 

31. Catherine Hencke, of Horenburg, Brandenburg, widow of 
Christian Grabert, a Catholic, who died in Biloxi, aged 50 
years. A daughter, 14 years old. Both sick. She needs some 
assistance and is very willing to work. Two arpents cleared. 

32. Christian Grabert, Grabert, of Brandenburg. Catholic; 23 
years old. His wife. An orphan child, 13 years old. Two 
arpents cleared. Three years on the place. One pig. 

1726: Christian Grabert, his wife, mother-in-law, sister-in- 
law, and sister. Six arpents cleared. 



86 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

1731 : Husband, wife, three children. Two cows. 
Descendants of the Grabert family still live in Ascension 
parish. La. 

33. Andreas Necker, of Dettenhausen, Wurtemberg. Lutheran; 
36 years old. Miller. His wife. Two arpents cleared. One 
year on the place. Two pigs. 

34. Jacob Oherle, of Zabern, Alsace. CathoHc; 35 years old. Two 
arpents cleared. One year on the place. 

The four arpents occupied by Necker and Oberle were 
situated between the two old villages and had served 
as a cemetery; but when the German people moved to 
the river front this cemetery was abandoned, where- 
upon Necker and Oberle took possession of it "a year 
ago". D'Arensbourg, however, whose land was con- 
tiguous to the cemetery, also claimed it on the ground 
that these four arpents had been cleared by the com- 
munity. 

("First") Old German Village. 

One mile and a half from the Mississippi and adjoining the "second" 

village. 

35. Andreas Schenck, from Saxony; Lutheran; 35 years old. Far- 
mer, prevot of a village. His wife and a child of two years. 
Land at discretion. Always serves with the troops as a mu- 
sician. 

1727 : Andreas Schenck, wife and two children. 

36. Marcus Thiel, of Bergwies, Silesia. Lutheran; 43 years old. 
Shoemaker. His wife. Land at discretion. Always sick. 

37. Morits Kohler, of Berne, Switzerland. Calvinist; 64 years old. 
Butcher. Served for thirty years in France in Swiss regi- 
ments. His wife. Land at discretion. Wants to return to 
France. 

1729: Kobler's widow, Emerentia Lottermann, of Berne, 
married in this year Jacob Weisskraemer, from Ba- 
varia, whose wife as well as his parents, Abraham and 
Magdalena W., had died at Fort Balize at the mouth 
of the Mississippi. In 1745 Jacob Weisskraemer mar- 
ried in Pointe Coupee Margarethe Frangoice Sara, 
the widow of one Jolier. 

38. Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg, "captain reforme", aged 31 years. 
An orphan boy from 10 to 12 years old. A cow and a calf 
from the company. A bull belonging to him. Two pigs. Twelve 
arpents. Not much cleared from lack of force. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 87 

The census here informs us that the village just mentioned 
(the first old German village) had been founded by twenty-one 
German families, that some had died and others had moved to 
the river front, having been drowned out by the great hurricane 
three years previous. Schenck, Thiel and Kobler seem to have 
come over from the second village. This is the reason why 
these three had "land at their discretion," there being, as the 
census remarks, at least 100 arpents of beautifully cleared land 
in the neighborhood of this village, cleared, no doubt, by the 
twenty-one German families, the founders of the first village. 
But now, the census continues, these three men also want to 
leave and move to the other village (the second one), nearer to 
those abandoned lands, which they would now like to take up. 
This, the census man thinks, would be right as far as those 
lands are concerned which were abandoned more than a year 
ago, because the parties who left had in the meantime been able 
to clear enough new land to support their families and to con- 
tinue farming. The fourteen families remaining in the second 
village, nearer the river, were all doing well, except the widows, 
and did not think of moving. 

Having completed the two villages in the rear, the com- 
piler of the census now evidently begins again at the river front, 
going down. 

39. Andreas Traeger (now Tregre), of Donauwoerth, Bavaria. Ca- 
tholic; 37 years old; hunter. His wife with a child at her 
breast. Three arpents cleared. Two years on the place. "A 
good worker. Well lodged. His yard, 90 x 90, staked off with 
palisades. Well cleared. Birds have caused a great deal of 
damage." One cow from the company. One pig. 

1726: Four arpents cleared. 

1731 : Husband, wife, three children. Two negroes ; three 

cows. 
Andreas Traeger was the progenitor of all the Tregre 

families in Louisiana. 

40. Jacob Lueck, of Weissenburg. Forty-five years old. Separated 
from his wife, who lives in the village (See No. 30). "Left 
his place to go to Natchez, but is back now. Lazy, and a very 
bad man." 



88 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

41. Andreas Hofmann, from the marquisate of Ansbach, Bavaria. 
Catholic; 27 years old. His wife. A daughter aged seven 
years. One and a half arpents cleared. A pig. 

1726: Four arpents cleared. 

1731 : Husband, wife and four children. 

4J. Mathias Friedrich, of Weilersheim, Alsace. (There were two 
Friedrich families in the colony then.) (See No. 2.) Catholic; 
29 years old. His wife with a child at the breast. An orphan 
girl, aged 15 years. One and a half arpents cleared. "Good 
worker." A cow from the company. A calf and three pigs. 
1726: Husband, wife, and three children. Six arpents 

cleared. 
1731 : Four cows. 

43. Bernhard Reusch, from the Palatinate. Catholic; 52 years of 
age. Tailor. His wife. A son of fifteen and a daughter of 
eleven years. One and a half arpents cleared. Two years on 
the place. Water caused much damage. Two pigs. 

1726: Four arpents cleared. 

44. Paul Klomp (Klump?), of Bauerbach, near Karlsruhe, Baden. 
Catholic; 30 years old. His wife. A son three and a half years 
old. An orphan boy of 12 years. One and a half arpents 
cleared. Three years on the place. Ground overflowed. Has 
been sick. 

1724: Four arpents cleared. 

45. The Chapel with house and kitchen. Garden. Cemetery of 
about one and a half arpents. It was at the completion of this 
new cemetery that the cemetery between the two old villages 
was abandoned. 

46. Adam Schmitz, a widower of Isnen, Suevia, Germany. Lu- 
theran ; 44 years old. Shoemaker. A daughter of nine years. 
Two years on the place. Eight verges cleared. "Works at his 
trade, making galoshes." 

47. Johann Rodler, of Rastadt, Baden. CathoHc; 35 years old. 
Locksmith. Works at his trade. His wife. Two years on the 
place. Eight verges cleared. Deaf. 

1726: Four arpents cleared. 

48. Anton Distelzweig, of Selz, Alsace. Catholic; 29 years old. 
His wife. One child, one and a half years old. "Good worker." 
Three arpents or 32 verges cleared. 

49. William Pictot, 50 years old, from Bretagne. 

50. Friedrich Merkel, from Wurtemberg. Catholic; 30 years old. 
His wife Marianne Kohleisen. Sixteen verges cleared. Two 
years on the place. "Good worker." Two pigs. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 89 

1726: Four arpents cleared. In the same year Friedrich 
Merkel married Anna Barbara Friedrich, daughter of 
Conrad F. and Ursula Frey. (See No. 2). Merkel's 
name occurs for the last time in the census of 1727. 
Anna Barbara Friedrich, his widow, then married 
Nik. Wichner. (See No. 2). 

51. Peter Muench, of Oberheim, in the Palatinate. Catholic; 40 
years old. His wife. A son, one year old. Two arpents cleared. 
Two years on the place. Works at his trade. 

1726: Four arpents cleared. 

52. Andreas Struempfl, of Ottersheim, near Fort Kehl, Baden. 
Catholic; 23 years old. His wife. Two daughters. Two ar- 
pents cleared. Two years on the place. A cow and a calf ; two 
pigs. 

1728: Anna Barbara Struempfl baptized. 

Another daughter by the name of Agnes married, about 

1748, Johannes Ettler, of Colmar, Alsace. 
1731 : Three children. Two cows. 

53. Johann Adam Riehl, of Hatzweiler, Basle, Switzerland. Catho- 
lic; 45 years old. Carpenter. His wife. Daughter of five 
months. One and a half arpents cleared. Two years on the 
place. 

54. Jacques Poche, 45 years old, native of Omer, in Artois. 

55. Joseph Wagenshach (now Waguespack), of Schwobsheim, 
Upper Alsace. Catholic; 23 years old. His wife. One and a 
half arpents cleared. Two years on the place. 

1726: One child. Six arpents cleared. 
1731: Three children. Two negroes; two cows. 
Joseph Wagensbach was the progenitor of all the Wagues- 
pack families in Louisiana. 

56. Sibylla Heil, widow of Wiedel, 37 years old, of Elchingen, 
Suevia, Germany. Catholic. Two years on the place. One 
and a half arpents cleared. "A good worker." 

57. Johann Adam Edelmeier, of Reiheim, Palatinate. Calvinist; 
50 years old. Cooper. Two boys, 10 and 14 years of age. A 
daughter, Maria Barbara, married Lionnois, a sailor from 
Lyons. Three arpents cleared. Two pigs. "A very good 
worker, who deserves attention." 

1726: Six arpents cleared. 

1728 : Marie Christine Edelmeier baptized. 

1731 : Five children. One negro; two cows. 

58. Philipp Zahn, of Grosshoeflein, Hungary. Catholic; 25 years 
of age. His wife. Three arpents cleared. Two years on the 
place. A pig. 



go The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

1726: One child. Four arpents cleared. 

1727: As widower of Margarethe Wiethen (ine) Philipp 
Zahn married in this year Marie Schlotterbecker of 
Wurtemberg, widow of Jacob Stalle and sister of the 
wife of Thomas Lesch. 

The census at this time mentions the land forming the pas- 
sage of three arpents' width, leading from the river front to the 
concession of M. de Meure. According to a map of 1731, this 
place was about two miles above Hahnville. 

59. Johann Jacob Folts (now "Folse"), of Ramstein, Palatinate. 
Catholic ; 26 years old. Shoemaker. His wife. A child of one 
year. Four arpents cleared. Two years on the place. One 
pig. This year made only seven barrels of rice on account of 
inundation. Was sick the whole summer. 

173 1 : Two children. Two cows. 

60. Bernhard Anton, of Schweigen, in Wurtemberg. Lutheran; 
30 years old. His wife. A boy, 10 years old. About four 
arpents cleared. Two pigs. Two years on the place. Made 
this year 20 barrels of rice, and would have also made 60 bar- 
rels of corn, if there had been no inundation. "Good worker." 

1731 : Three children. One engage. Six cows. 

After enumerating these families, the census of 1724 
continues : 

"All these German families enumerated in the present census 
raise large quantities of beans and mallows, and do much gardening, 
which adds to their provisions and enables them to fatten their 
animals, of which they raise many. They also work to build levees 
in front of their places. 

'Tf all these small farmers were in the neighborhood of New 
Orleans they could raise vegetables and poultry. They could make 
their living well and add to the ornament of the town, as their small 
frontage on the river brings their houses with the gardens behind 
them so close together that they look like villages. But this agree- 
able condition unfortunately does not exist in New Orleans, 6wing 
to the greed for land of those who demanded large concessions, 
not with the intention of cultivating them, but only of reselling them. 

"If these German families, the survivors of a great number 
who have been here, are not assisted by negroes, they will gradually 
perish; for what can a man and his wife accomplish on a piece of 
land, when, instead of resting themselves and taking their meals 
after their hard work, they must go to the pounding trough (pilon) 
to prepare their food, a very toilsome work, the consequences of 
which are dangerous for men and women. Many receive injuries, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 91 

and many women get seriously hurt. When one of the two falls 
sick, it is absolutely necessary that the other should do all the work 
alone, and thus both perish, examples of which are not rare. 

"The ground is so hard in the lower part of the colony that one 
must always have the hoe ready, and the weeds come out so strong 
and so quickly, that it seems after a short while as if no work had 
been done at all. The land is covered with dead trees and stumps, 
and these people have no draught animals (as this census shows there 
was not a single horse on the German Coast, and of the 56 families 
only six had cows), they cannot use the plow, but must always work 
with the pickaxe and the hoe. 

"This together with the hard work on the pilon, causes these 
poor people to perish, who are good workers and willing, and who 
do not desire anything more than to remain in a country where they 
are free from burdensome taxation and from the rule of the master 
of their land — a lot quite different from that of the peasants in 
Germany. 

"They would consider themselves very happy to get one or 
two negroes, according to the land they have, and we would soon 
find them to be good overseers. The only thing to be done would 
be to visit them once or twice a year, to see what use they are making 
of them, and to take the negroes away from the lazy ones and give 
them to the industrious. But this would hardly be necessary, as 
these people are by nature industrious and more contented than the 
French. 

"They could also feed their negroes very well on account of 
the great quantities of vegetables they raise. They could also sell 
a great deal to the large planters, and these, assured of a regular 
supply, could give more attention to the raising of indigo, the cut- 
ting of timber, and to other things suitable for exportation to France 
and Cape Frances (San Domingo). I am persuaded that a great 
timber trade could be established with the West Indian Islands, 
where timber is getting scarcer and is dear." 

Left Bank of the Mississippi River. 
Continuation of the Census of 1724. 

The land immediately above New Orleans and on the same 
side of the Mississippi, beginning beyond the moat of the upper 
town limit (now foot of Bienville street), and extending up to 
the center of the great bend of the river at Southport, beyond 
Carrollton, belonged to M. Bienville — in all, 213^^ arpents river 
front. 

This is, no doubt, the land which the census enumerator, 
a French official, quoted above, had in view when he said, "If 



92 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

these German farmers were in the neighborhood of New Orleans 
* * * ," And when he speaks of "the greed of those who 
demanded large concessions," he evidently referred also to Gov- 
ernor Bienville. 

The lower portion of Bienville's land — from Bienville street 
to somewhere about Felicity road, 58^ arpents' front — Bienville 
reserved for his own habitation. Of this tract he sold a part 
to the Jesuit fathers. From Felicity road up to Southport 
he placed, as has been stated, twelve German and a few 
French families, most of whom received their titles on and after 
the first of January, 1723. But by the time the census of 1724 
was taken, a number of these had left. The fact that the Ger- 
mans had already once before lost their all by a great hurricane 
and inundation, and the failure of Bienville to build a levee, al- 
though he had guaranteed one to them in their titles, and the 
consequent inundations they were subjected to even in the first 
year, together with the exacting conditions of rental to be ful- 
filled — all these were causes to compel these people to sell 
out their contracts as quickly as they could. Some had already 
left during the first year, and Jacob Huber, the last German to 
remain on Bienville's land, stayed only from 1723 to 1727. 

Partly from census reports, and partly from chains of titles 
of Bienville's hands, the author has been able to ascertain the 
names of most of the German storm victims who settled on Bien- 
ville's lands : 

Peter Bayer, from Wankenloch, near Durlach, Baden, who had 
taken six arpents of Bienville's land above New Orleans. 

Caspar Hegli, a Swiss, from near Lucerne. "Six arpents. Catholic ; 
35 years old. His wife. A daughter. Two orphan boys. A 
cow, a heifer, a young bull, and three pigs. Two years on the 
place. Used two and a half barrels of seed rice and did not make 
more than three barrels on account of inundation. Has a very 
fine garden enclosed by palisades. He has made a good levee 
and is a good worker. He deserves a negro." (Census of 
1724.) 

Jacob Huber, with six arpents. "Native of Suevia, Germany. 
Catholic; 45 years old. His wife, son of 16 years. One en- 
gage. One cow, one heifer, a pig. Made no crop on account 
of inundation. Good worker." (Census of 17124.) 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 93 

Jacob Ruber's son Christoph married Marie Josephine St. 
Ives. Descendants write the name now "Oubre", 
"Ouvre", "Hoover". 

Andreas Krestmann, or Christmann, from Augsburg, with his two 
sons, 10 and 12 years old. Six arpents. "Wheelwright. His 
wife. Two orphan girls, eight and fifteen years old. Two 
years on the place. A cow, a heifer, a calf and three pigs. He 
is industrious and is at work fencing in his cleared land. He 
made a good levee and paid in advance the workmen who made 
it for him at a cost of 100 pistoles. Deserves a negro." 

These four men occupied a portion of Bienville's land from 
the present First street of New Orleans to Napoleon avenue. 
Further up, beginning about the upper line of Audubon Park, 
were: 

Simon Kuhn, of Weissenburg, Ansbach, Bavaria. "His wife, daugh- 
ter, son-in-law, Daniel Hopf, 20 years of age of Cassen, dio- 
cese of Spire. Orphan boy, 12 years old. Cow, calf, three 
pigs. One year on the land. Had to change his engagements 
twice, having been forced to give up his cabin on account 
of water. Good worker." (Census of 1724.) An elder daugh- 
ter of Simon Kuhn, Anna Kuhn, was the widow of Johann 
Adam Zweig (Labranche), who had died in Biloxi. She had 
a daughter of the age of 12 years. The orphan boy, 12 years 
old, was, no doubt a relative, and very likely that Jean La- 
branche who, in 1737, married Susanna Marchand and became 
the progenitor of all the Labranche families in Louisiana. 
Daniel Hopf (French spelling "Yopf" and "Poff") married, in 
1727, Anna Maria Werich, of Lampaitz, German Lorraine. A 
daughter of this second marriage, Renee "Poff", married, 1752, 
in Pointe Coupee, Pierre Baron. 

Thomas Lesch (now "Leche" and "Laiche"), with three arpents. 
"His wife. One engaged (Census of 1726.) Thomas Lesch 
married, in 1725, in the cathedral of New Orleans, Anna Scho- 
derbecker of Wurtemberg. Only daughters were bom from 
this marriage: 

Margarethe Lesch married one Peter Engel, a carpenter, 
whose name occurs also in the spelling "Aingle", 
"Ingle", "Hingle", and "Engle". There were three 
sons, Simon, Sylvestre and Santjago Hingle, who mar- 
ried into the Bura family in Plaquemines parish (Bu- 
ra's Settlement). The "Hingle" family is quite 
numerous there. 
Regina Lesch, another daughter of Thomas Lesch, mar- 
ried one Christian Philippson. 



94 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Joseph Strantz, with three arpents. 

One Mueller, with six arpents. 

Johann Weher, the progenitor of the "Webre" families in Louisiana, 
with six arpents near the upper Hmits of Bienville's lands, 
now Carrollton. He was born near Fort Kehl, Baden, and was 
then 24 years old. (Census of 1724.) His wife was Marie 
Stadler, who came to Louisiana with her parents, Ulrich and 
Maria Stadler, on one of the four pest ships. "Mother-in-law, 
an orphan girl, aged 16 years. Cow, heifer, bull, four pigs. 
One year on the place." 

The conditions under which these lands were given to the 
German storm victims by Bienville, were: From six to eight 
livres annual ground rent for each arpent and, every year, two 
capons and two days' work "in the form of corvee" for each 
arpent. Jacob Huber paid eight livres ground rent. Bienville 
subjected even the Jesuit fathers, who, on the first of May, 1728, 
bought five arpents from him, to conditions similar to these, in- 
cluding even that of corvee. This is true, also, of the Canadians 
who held lands from him on the Algiers side of the river. 

The people of Bienville's lands must also repay the ad- 
vances made to them by Bienville. These consisted usually of 
provisions for one year, a cow in calf, two hogs, four chickens 
with a cock, and the necessary utensils and agricultural imple- 
ments. Utensils, provisions and implements must be paid for 
at the end of the first two years. The cow must be returned 
within three years, and of all the cattle raised in excess of the 
first twelve head Bienville was to receive one half. For the 
two hogs furnished he demanded a fat hog every second year, 
and for the four chickens and the cock six fat hens or capons 
were demanded every year. 

In the census of 1726 these Germans were called "Vas- 
seaux allemands." Indeed, they were "vassals." (See Volume 
"Concessions.") 

In the Chapitoulas district above Carrollton began the 
great concessions of Deubreuil, Chauvin de Lery, Chauvin de 
Beaulieu, Chauvin de la Freniere, St. Rayne, all large concerns 
worked by negro labor. 

Continuing our trip up the river, on the left side, we find 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 95 

in 1724 the habitations and concessions of Dartigniere & Benac, 
Henry Pellerin, Cousin, Vaquir, Dire (Dire leaved in Cannes 
Brulees), d'Artagnan, Chautreau de Beaumont, Pujeau & Ka- 
vasse, Meran & Ferandou, Bouette, Chaval, Chesneau, Dauny, 
and Pierre Brou. 

The habitations of Chesneau and Dauny were later, after 
1727, acquired by Caspas Dubs (Toups) and Ambros Heidel 
(Haydel), who, in 1724, were yet neighbors on the other side of 
the river on the German Coast. 

Continuing our trip up the river, we find in 1724 the habi- 
tations of Pommier, Picollier, Sainton, Dizier, Dejean, and Pel- 
loin. Then we meet again Germans : 

Peter Schmidt, from the Palatinate. Catholic; 34 years old. His 
wife, his brother-in-law, aged 17 years. Three arpents cleared, 
which he had bought for 400 livres. 

Bartholomaeus Yens (?), of Cologne. Catholic; 25 years old. A 
brewer. His wife, with a child at the breast. Three arpents 
cleared. 

Then we pass the habitations of St. Pierre, St. Julien, Go- 
bert, Reux, Caution, Guichard, Piquery, Petit de Livilliers, Du- 
cros, Lantheaume. Then comes: 

Joseph Ritter, of Durlach, Baden, 52 years old, a carpenter. His 
wife, a son of 20 years, two orphan girls of 14 and 19 years. 
About three years on the place. Three pigs. Works at his 
trade. "Is a good worker and deserves some negroes." 

Then we come to the Baillifs, Claude Baillif from Picardy, 
and 

Joseph Bailliff, of Dieux, in German Lorraine, aged 22 years. His 
wife. Eight arpents cleared, which he had bought for 250 
livres. His widow married later Michael Zehringer, of whom 
we shall hear soon. 

Nik. Schmits, of Frankfurt. Catholic; 40 years of age. His wife. 
A daughter of 18 and one of six years. Eight arpents, which 
he had bought for 800 livres. "Made a good levee and is a 
good worker." 

Peter Bayer. Catholic; 23 years old. His wife. Two arpents of 
land, which he had bought for 210 livres, having given up the 
land which he had from Governor Bienville. He brought all 
his things with him. Had not made more than two barrels of 



96 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

rice and a quantity of girammons, which was all that was left 
to him after paying M. Bienville. "Is a very good worker and 
satisfied with his small piece of land for his fortune." 

Johann Fuchs, of the canton of Berne, Switzerland. Catholic; 38 
years old. His wife, with a daughter at her breast. Four 
arpents, for which he had paid 250 livres. About one year on 
the place, "On account of sickness and misery he made no 
crop." 

Lor ens Ritter, Jr., aged 20 years. Begins to establish himself on 
eight arpents. 

From there up the left bank to where the census enumera- 
tor of 1724 stopped, there lived only Frenchmen and Canadians. 

As the census of 1724, the first one to give the names of 
the German habitants, covers only the territory above New Or- 
leans, and does not contain the names of the orphans staying 
with the German families, nor of the numerous engages, many 
German people consequently remained unaccounted for. If the 
registers of the chapel on the German Coast, of which the 
census of 1724 speaks, and which had a resident priest as 
early as 1729, had not been lost, and if the records of the St. 
Louis Cathedral, in New Orleans, had not been to a great extent 
destroyed in the great fire of March 21st, 1788, many of these 
names could be recovered. As matters stand, only the cathedral 
records from 1720 to 1732 are available, which together with 
scattered court records and other ofificial papers will be used 
here. 



Additional German Names of the Period^ Not in the 

Census. 

There were : 

Michael Zehringer, the progenitor of all the "Zeringue" 
families in Louisiana. He signed his name in German script 
"Michael Zehringer." He was from Franconia, Bavaria. His 
name appears first on the passenger list of the ship "Le Droma- 
daire" in 1720, together with sixty workmen under the command 
of de la Tour, the chief engineer of the colony. In 1721 Zehr- 
inger heads the list of "ouvriers" of the king as master carpen- 
ter. In 1722 we find Michael Zehringer in Biloxi, where in 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 97 

tearing down a house he found, according to a proces verbal 
still existing, a number of articles which had been taken away 
from the old fort and hidden there. In the same year his wife, 
Ursula Spaet, died, and, six weeks later, his daughter Salome, 
aged 18 years. 

In the next year he married Barbara Haertel, the widow 
first of Magnus Albert (who came over with her in one of the 
pest ships) and then of Joseph Bailliff. By her Zehringer had 
four sons: Michael, Pierre Laurent, Joseph, and Jean Louis. 

The census of 1731 mentions Michael Zehringer as living 
below Chapitoulas, somewhere in the Sixth District of New 
Orleans. His family then consisted of his wife and three chil- 
dren. He had one engage, twelve negroes, four negresses and 
twenty-seven cows. He died in 1738, and one of the witnesses 
in his succession was Louis Wiltz. 

JoHANN" LuDWiG WiLTZ, the progenitor of the New Or- 
leans branch of the Wiltz family, is not mentioned in the cen- 
sus. Johann Ludwig Wiltz, of Eisenach, Thuringia, Germany, 
was born in 171 1. (He wrote his name "Wilsz" as does the 
family in Eisenach to the present day.) In a later official docu- 
ment referring to the disposition of some land belonging to 
him, it is stated that his father-in-law, Wm. Siriac, was living 
on it. Siriac (see census of 1724, No. 5) had but one daugh- 
ter, who, at the taking of the census of 1731 no longer lived 
with her parents. So the marriage of Louis Wiltz may have 
occurred in 1731, when Wiltz was twenty years of age. At 
the taking of the census of 1724, he was only thirteen years old, 
and he was therefore almost certainly one of the orphans whose 
names are not mentioned in the census of 1724. 

JoHANN Katzenberger, who, in 1722, while yet an engage, 
married Christine "de Viceloque" (from Wiesloch, near Heidel- 
berg, Germany), lived in the village of Gentilly, one and a half 
miles from New Orleans. He was from Heidelberg. In Gen- 
tilly he had an engage and eight arpents of land. The name of 
the family has been changed into "Gasbergue." 

Simon Berlinger, of Blaubayern in Wurtemberg, was 
Katzenberger's neighbor in Gentilly. He had a wife and a son. 



98 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

and owned eight arpents of land. His first wife was Cath. 
Rode, the widow of Jacob Herkomm, who had died "aux Alle- 
mands." In 1725 BerHnger married Ehse Flick of Biel, Baden, 
whose first husband, Joseph Ziegler, had died in L'Orient. Ber- 
Hnger later moved up to the German Coast. 

JoHANN Weiss with his little son lived on the north shore 
of Lake Pontchartrain. There were then only five families 
with fourteen persons living on the lake shore. One of them 
was called "Lacombe," and it may be that "Bayou Lacombe," 
between Bonfuca and Mandeville, was named after that family. 
Descendants of this Joh. Weiss live in Pointe Coupee. 

Weisskraemer. Down near the mouth of the Mississippi, 
at a point called "Fort Balize," was the family of Weisskraemer, 
from Bavaria. 

WiCHNER. Then there were the progenitors of all the 
"Vicner," "Vicnair," and "Vickner" families. Nik. "Wichner" 
came in 1720 with his wife, Therese, and a child of one year 
on board the ship "L'Elephant," and was destined for the con- 
cession of Le Blanc, on the Yazoo River. His wife died some 
years afterward, and then he married Barbara Friedrich, the 
widow of Friedrich Merkel (see census of 1724, Nos. 2 and 
50). The little child the Wichners brought from Germany 
seems to have survived, for the records of Pointe Coupee inform 
us that in 1777 

"Gratien Vicner (Gratian probably stands for "Christian"), 
the son of Nik. Vicner and Theresa . . . ' married Marie Louise 
Cortez", and, in the same year, a child was born to them — 
Marie Louise. 

Sons of Nik. Wichner and Barbara Friedrich married there, 
too, about this time : 

1772: Antoine Vicner, son of Nik. Vicner and Barbara 
Friedrich, married Perinne Cuvellier, daughter of 
Pierre C. and Marie Arrayo", and 

1777: "David Vicner, son of Nik. V. and Barb. Friedrich, 
married Marie Margarethe Cuvellier, a sister of Pe- 
rinne". She died 1781 in St. John the Baptist. 

On board the same vessel by which Nik. Wichner and his 
family came to Louisiana there was one 

Francois Wichner, his wife Charlotte and two children, 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 99 

two and four years old. Charlotte Wichner died in New Or- 
leans in 1727, and her husband died in Pointe Coupee in 1728 
as "habitant and entrepreneur." 

Yet the name of this family does not appear in any census 
enumeration until 1731, when "Nik. Wichner, his wife and a 
child" are entered as habitants of Cannes Brulees. 

RiCHNER (Rixner). From a petition addressed by the tutor 
of the children of de la Chaise to the Superior Council in 1730, 
we learn that one Rixner, a German, (signatures of the family 
prove that the original name was "Richner") had been man- 
ager of a plantation below New Orleans for three years. His 
time would expire in June, 1730, and a family meeting should 
have been called at that time to arrange for a continuance of 
the improvements on said plantation. In the census enumera- 
tions Johann Georg Richner appears for the first time in 1731. 
He lived then opposite New Orleans, two lieues above the town. 
There was then also a "Rixner fils," who was not yet married 
and who owned three negroes and three cows. Richner's daugh- 
ter Margarethe married, in 1728, Jacob Kindler, a Swiss, and 
died the same year. Richner's wife was a sister of Ambros 
Heidel's mother. Johann Georg Richner came to Louisiana on 
board "La Saone," one of the four pest ships, in 172 1. His name 
is not contained in the census of 1724. 

ScHAF (Chauffe). Then there was the family of Schaf, 
of Weissenburg. Jacob Schaf and his wife Marianne sailed with 
five children for Louisiana on the pest ship "La Garonne" on 
the 24th of January, 1721. From church records it appears 
that the wife of Ambros Heidel (Haydel), Anna Margarethe, 
was a daughter of Schaf. Ambros Heidel had also a brother-in- 
law with him. Another daughter of Schaf married one Clai- 
reaux, and later, as her second husband, Franz Anton Steiger, 
from the diocese of Constance, Baden, while Anton Schaf, the 
eldest son, became the son-in-law of Andreas Schenck in 1737 
(see census of 1724, No. 35). Yet no census mentions the 
Schaf family. 

ScHECKSCHNEiDER. On the same ship and on the same day 
sailed from L'Orient the Scheckschneider family, Hans Rein- 
hard Scheckschneider, his wife and two children. One son, Jacob, 



lOO The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

was landed in Brest and died there. Nothing more is heard of 
the parents, and only after 1730 their second son, Albert "Seg- 
shneider," the progenitor of the numerous Scheckschneider fam- 
ilies appears as a habitant. He, too, must have been one of 
the many nameless orphans whom the census of 1724 mentions 
in connection with the German families. 

ZwEiG (Labranche). On the 24th of January, 1721, there 
sailed on the pest ship "Les Deux Freres" from L'Orient a 
second Zweig family, Jean Zweig, with his wife and two chil- 
dren, who came from the neighborhood of Bamberg, Bavaria, 
Germany. The parents probably died before the census of 1724 
was taken; their daughter was married as early as 1724 to 
Joseph Verret, but nothing is heard of the second child of the 
Zweig family, a little son,^^ until he, in 1737, bought land at 
what is now called "Waggaman," on the right bank of the Mis- 
sissippi, opposite the habitation of his brother-in-law, Verret, 
who lived in "La Providence," on the left bank. There young 
Zweig married Susanna Marchand, of St. Marcellin, Grenoble, 
France, but then an orphan in the Ursuline Convent in New 
Orleans. The marriage contract which the author found in 
official acts in the custody of the "Louisiana Historical Society" 
was signed on the 6th of November, 1737. In this marriage 
contract the officiating French notary changed the name "Zweig" 
into "Labranche." The name Zweig being difficult to pronounce 
and still more difficult to write, as it contains sounds for which 
the French language has no signs, and young Zweig not being 
able to sign his name (so the contract states), it was but natural 
for the French notary to inquire into the meaning of the word 
"Zweig." Hearing that it meant in French "la branche," he put 
"Labranche" down as the family name of the bridegroom, and 
this has remained the family name ever since. The La- 
branche family has preserved to the present day the tradition of 
its German descent and of the original name "Zweig." 

Having also found the joint last will and testament of Jean 
Zweig and Susanna Marchand made on the 21st of October, 
1780, as well as the papers of the Labranche-Marchand succes- 

" See Census of 1724 : " Simon Kuhn" on Bienville's lands. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana loi 

sion, settled in 1785, the writer is able to give the correct list 
of the children of Jean Zweig and Susanna Marchand. As to the 
later descendants thanks are due to Chas. Theodore Soniat Du- 
fossat, Esq., one of the many distinguished descendants of the 
Labranche family, whose mother, Marie Amenaide Labranche, 
was a granddaughter of Michael Labranche, the eldest son of 
Jean Zweig. 

Children of Jean Zweig (Labranche) and Susanna Marchand. 

1. Michel Labranche, who married Louise Fortier and left seven 
children. He died in 1787. Female descendants married into 
the Le Blanc, Porthier, Sarpy, Fortier, Soniat Dufossat, Au- 
gustin, Beugnot, Wogan, Dupre, Villere, Larendon, de la Barre, 
Godberry, Second, Brown, Lesseps, Oxnard, Sanchez, Chastant, 
and Martin families. 

2. Alexander Labranche, one of the signers of the constitution of 
1812, married a Miss Piseros and left five children. His son, 
Octave, became Speaker of the Louisiana House of Repre- 
sentatives. 

His son Alcee was also Speaker of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, Member of Congress, and United States 
Ambassador to the Republic of Texas. 

Female descendants of Alexander Labranche married into 
the Tricou, de la Barre, Soniat, Dufossat, Chalard, 
Dupuy, Meteye, Dauphine, Michel, Sarpy, Heidel 
(Haydel), Fortier (a grandson of Edmund Fortier 
and F elicit e Labranche, is Professor Alcee Fortier of 
the Tulane University of Louisiana), Ganucheau, 
Aime, Piseros, Villere, Augustin, Schreiber, Toby, 
Frederic, Brou, Le Blanc, Grevenberg, Berault, Lal- 
land, Blois, Wood, Jumonville, Bouligny, Albert Bald- 
win, and Dr. Smythe families. 

3. Jean Labranche died single. 

4. Susanna Labranche married Joseph Wiltz in 1759, and died in 
1777. She had two children; Joseph Louis Laurent Wiltz, 
with whom the New Orleans branch of the Wiltz family became 
extinct in the male line in 181 5 ; and Hortense Wiltz, who mar- 
ried, in 1789, Juan Leonardo Arnould. Their son, Julien Ar- 
nould, married (1829) Manuela Amasilie Daunoy; their daugh- 
ter, Jeanne Aimee Arnould, married Frangois Trepagnier, and 
their second daughter, Louise Mathilde, married Jean de Dieu 
Garcia. 

5. Genevieve Labranche married Alexander Baure. 

6. Marie Louise Labranche married Frangois Trepagnier. 



I02 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Additional German Names of the Period Not in the 

Census. 
There were: 

Nikolaus^ Christian and Conrad Kugel^ three brothers, 
whose parents died in L'Orient; 

Louis Leonhard_, who married, in 1728, the daughter of 
Stephan Kistenmacher ; 

Paul Anton Mueller^ of Halle, who married, in 1728, 
Frangoise Bourdon; 

JoHANN Kretzen^ whose wife was Elise Kerner; 

Bernhard Rauch, who died in New Orleans, in 1728, aged 
fifty years; 

Lorenz Rauch ; 

Johann Keck^ of Bamberg, who died in New Orleans in 
1725, aged sixty years; 

Johann Wechers^ of Strassburg, whose parents died in 
Cannes Brulees, and who was the husband of Magdalena Acker- 
mann ; 

Rudolph Martin^ whose wife was Marg. Besel, of Neu- 
stadt ; 

Jacob Stahl; 

Johann Georg Staehle ; 

Joseph Ricker; 

Lorenz Goetz, of Dicklingen, diocese of Spite; 

Johann Stricker; 

Nikolaus Hubert ; 

Andreas Tet, of Differdangen, Luxembourg, diocese of 
Treve (Trier). This family still exists on Bayou Lafourche. 

Joseph Ritter; 

Tinker, of Frankfurt; 

Daniel Raffland^ of Berne, Switzerland; 

Nikolaus Weiss^ of Wolkringen, Berne; 

Johannes Ettler, of Colmar, Alsace; 

Johann Adam Schmidt; 

Johann Adam Kindeler^ or Kindler, a Swiss; 

Anton Ringeisen; 

Adam Trischl, the progenitor of all the "Triche" families ; 

Anton Lesch^ the progenitor of all the "Leche" and 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 103 

"Laiche" families and probably a younger brother of Thomas 
Lesch. 

Daniel Mietsch, of Wuerzburg ; 

Georg Anton Memminger; 

Balthasar Clausen; 
^ Jacob Eckel, of Weilburg; 

^ JoHANN Nerle ; 

Georg Rapp ; 

JoHANN Bapt. Manz, the progenitor of the "Montz" fam- 
ilies. 

All these names the author found in church records. More- 
over, the census of 1724 does not contain the names of those still 
on Law's second plantation below English Turn. These names 
alone prove that the German population of Louisiana during that 
period was much larger than the census of 1724 would make it 
appear. 

A Census Without a Date. 

There is a census of inhabitants and their lands which is 
not dated. Several reasons invite the belief that this census was 
taken after 1732. As it gives the latest grouping, it may follow 
here. It will be noticed that all the Germans had left Bienville's 
lands, and had gone up to the German Coast on both sides of 
the Mississippi. In some instances the sons of the original habi- 
tants appear as landowners. 

Left Bank. 

Beginning at "La Providence" (opposite "Waggaman" ) . 

.Joseph Verret, husband of M. Marg. Zweig 

(Labranche) ; 
. Johann Weber; 
.Louis Dubs (Toups) ; 
.Caspar Dubs (Toups); 
. Ambros Heidel (Hay del) ; 
.Pierre Brou; 
.Louis Champagne; 
• Jacques Antoine Le Borne. 

These people being neighbors, and their children growing 
up together, sons of Dubs (Toups), Brou, Champagne, and Le 



14 


arpents . . 


6 




8 




8 




15 




15 




6 




10 





104 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Borne married Heidel girls, daughters of Ambros Heidel (Hay- 
del). 

4 arpents Nikolaus Wichner (Vicner, Vicnaire, Vickner) ; 

8 " ... .Daniel Hopf (Poff). Having married a second 
time, Hopf separated from his father-in-law 
Simon Kuhn, who crossed the river. 



Right Bank. 

Beginning two miles above New Orleans, going up to the German 

Villages, 

. . Johann Georg Richner (Rixner) ; 

. . Simon Kuhn ; 

. . Heinrich Christman ; 

. .Andreas Christman; 

. .Jacob Christmann; • 

. .Vandereck; 

. . Jacon Naegeli ; 

. . Philipp Zahn ; 

. .Jacob Foltz (Folse) ; 

. .Andreas Hofmann; 

. . Christian Grabert ; 

. . Caspar Hegli ; 

. .David Meunier; 

. . Jacob Rabel ; 

. . Jacob Weisskraemer ; 

. . Johann Adam Edelmeier ; 

. .Georg Troxler (Trosclair) ; 

. . Georg Raeser ; 

. .Jacob Huber (Oubre, Ouvre, Hoover); 

. . Bernhard Anton ; 

. . Mathias Friedrich ; 

. .Joseph Wagensbach (Waguespack) ; 

. . Andreas Struempfl ; 

. . Peter Muench ; 

. . Christoph Kaiser ; 

. . Simon Berlinger ; 

. . Adam Schmidt ; 



lO 


arpents . . 


lO 


a 


6 


a 


6 


it 


12 


a 


12 


a 


6 


u 


4 


a 


6 


it 


5 


a 


6 


li 


5 


a 


8 


ii 


6 


(I 


2 


a 


8 


It 


9 


li 


8 


t( 


6 


<i 


8 


li 


6 


li 


6 


a 


6 


li 


2 


it 


3 


li 


3 


it 


I 


i< 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 105 



5 arpents. 


. . . Joseph Andrae ; 




^ " 


. . . The Presbytery ; 




) 


. . . Andreas Traeger (Tregre) ; 




2 " 


. . . D' Arensbourg ; 




3 " . 


. . . Nikolaus Meyer ; 




6 " . 


. . .Jacob Ritter; 




8 " . 


. . . Adam Mattern ; 




6 " . 


. . .Leonhard Magdolff ; 




6 " . 


. . .Balthasar Marx; 




8 " . 


. . .Andreas Schantz (Chance) ; 




4 " • 


. . . Wilhelm Siriac ; 




4 " 


. . . Albert Scheckschneider ; 




6 " . 


. . . Bernhard Wick ; 




6 " . 


. . . Conrad Friedrich ; 




6 " . 


. . . Johann Rommel ; 




4 " • 


. . .Rudolph Gillen, a Swiss, and the successor 
Johann Weber on Bienville's lands ; 


of 


4 " • 


. . . Johann Callander ; 




2 " 


. . . Johann Georg Bock ; 




6 " . 


. . . Michael Vogel ; 




5 " • 


. . . Martin Lambert. 





Reinforcements for the Germans. 

The Germans on the German Coast of Louisiana received 
reinforcements at different times. 

In the first place the Swiss Soldiers, the majority of wlioni 
were Germans, and of whom there were always at least four 
companies in Louisiana during the French domination (until 
1768) naturally drifted to the German Coast, and settled there 
at the expiration of their time of service. As stated before, the 
Compagnie des Indes aided them to establish themselves. 

In 1754 a considerable number of people came from Lor- 
raine, so official acts inform us, and "were settled on the German 
Coast." No list of names, however, is available. Governor Ker- 
lerec wrote under date of July 4th, 1754 ("Notes and Docu- 
ments," page 409) : 

"I have received the families from Lorraine by the 'Concord'. 
They are established *aux Allemands' and work well. Many like 



io6 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

these would be necessary for the advancement of the colony — fami- 
lies accustomed to working the soil, whose energies would redouble 
in a country where the revenues would belong to them without the 
burden of taxation." 

In August, 1774, a large number of German families came 
from Frederic county, Maryland, which county had been a 
center of German immigration for many years. They travelled 
tc Hagerstown, Maryland, thence through the wilderness to Fort 
Pitt (now Pittsburg), whence they came in boats down the Ohio 
and Mississippi to Manchac. 

The Manchac of the Eighteenth Centuiy was not the same 
locality which most of us know as the little railroad station 
"Manchac" on the Illinois Central Railway, 38 miles north of 
New Orleans. Old "Manchac" was a post on the Mississippi 
River, fourteen miles by river below Baton Rouge and on the 
same side of the Mississippi. There "Bayou Manchac," at one 
time called "Ascantia," and also "Iberville River," branched off 
from the Mississippi, and, connecting with the Amite River, Lake 
Maurepas and Lake Pontchartrain, formed an inland waterway 
from the Mississippi River to the Mississippi Sound. 

It was because of this inland passage from the Mississippi 
tc the lakes, to the gulf, and to Mobile, that Manchac was once 
spoken of as the proper site for the future capital of Louisiana; 
and when, in 1718, the present site of New Orleans was selected 
for that purpose, it was done principally for the reason that 
New Orleans, through the Bayou St. John, also has water com- 
munication with the Lake Pontchartrain and Mobile, and is 
much nearer to the gulf than Manchac. 

Bayou Manchac was at the time of the arrival of these Ger- 
mans from Maryland the boundary line between Spanish America 
and the English territory. It was an important waterway and 
trading route (especially for illicit trade with the English), and 
remained so until 1814, when the American General Jackson 
(Battle of New Orleans, January 8th, 1815) fearing that the 
English, by a flank movement through Lake Pontchartrain and 
Bayou Manchac, might enter the Mississippi and gain his rear, 
had the bayou filled in. "Post Manchac" was on the upper side 
or English bank of the bayou, while on the lower side there was a 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 107 

"Spanish Fort" to defend the entrance into the Mississippi and 
the passage out of it. The recollection that the filling in of 
this bayou was a war measure still lingers with the native 
(Creole) population of the locality, but only dimly, for when 
the author asked one of those living near it when and why the 
bayou had been filled in, the man answered in all honesty that 
it was done during the "Confederate War" (1861 to 1865). 

The exact locality of this historic spot where the filling in 
occurred can be easily found now. It is at the railroad station 
"Rhoades" of the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railway, eighty 
miles north of New Orleans and ten miles (railroad distance) 
below Baton Rouge. There is "Rhoades' Coi^ntry Store" on 
the left or river side of the track, where, just at the station, a 
little ravine is seen which the railroad crosses. On the right side 
of the track the ravine is larger, and a little bridge leads over it. 
This ravine is old "Bayou Manchac." Trees have now grown 
up from the earth used in filling the bayou, so that the direction 
of the old waterway can be followed for some distance. Such 
historic spots as this ought to be marked by tablets to keep alive 
important traditions. 

The Germans from Maryland. 

About this neighborhood the Gefman families from Mary- 
land settled. Judge Carrigan says in De Bow's "Review" (New 
Series, IV., 255 and 616) : that they first took land below Hack- 
ett's Point, on the opposite side of the river, but that after several 
successive inundations they were compelled, in 1784, to abandon 
their improvements and seek refuge on the highlands (called, 
after them, "Dutch Highlands") : 

"where their descendants yet remain, ranking among the most 
industrious, wealthy, and enterprising citizens of the parish." 

There were many intermarriages between the Germans from 
Maryland and their descendants, and names of them were found 
by the writer in the church records of St. Gabriel, St. John the 
Baptist, St. James, Baton Rouge, and Plaquemine. Of these but 
two families will be mentioned, the two largest ones: "Klein- 
peter" and "Ory." 



io8 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

JOHANN GeORG KlEINPETER WITH HiS WiFE GERTRUDE^ FROM 

Maryland. 

"Naturales de Alemania". The entry of the marriage of his 
daughter Eva, in 1777, informs us that the bride was born in Strass- 
burg, Alsace, and so we may assume that the Kleinpeter family came 
originally from that city. The family tradition says that Kleinpeter 
came with six grown children to Louisiana. All were found. Ger- 
trude Kleinpeter died in 1806, aged seventy years, and was buried in 
the church yard of St. Gabriel. 

Children of Johann Georg Kleinpeter and his Wife 
Gertrude.^^ 

1. Johann Baptist Kleinpeter. His wife was Catherine Sharp 
from Maryland. 

A. Joseph Kleinpeter married in 1822 Caroline Theresa 

Dardenne. 

a. Mathilde married in 1843 Thos. Cropper; 

Edwin Cropper married in 1869 Felicie 
Dupuy ; 

b. Josephine married in 1849 Alverini Marion- 

neaux ; 

c. Euphemie Henriette married in 1853 Amilcar 

Dupuy ; 

d. Paul Gervais married in 1863 Pamela Isabella 

Kleinpeter, daughter of Chas. K. and Lucinde 
Cropper ; 

B. Isabella Kleinpeter married in 1800 Henry Thomas, 

son of Henry Th. and Barbara Ory, all from Mary- 
land. 

2. Joseph Kleinpeter. He married (1796) Magdalena Sharp, 
daughter of Paul Sh. and Cath. Ory, all from Maryland. 

A. Marie Rosie Kleinpeter married in 1834 Jean Michel 

Bouillon. 

B. Elisabeth Floresca Kleinpeter, baptized in 1807. 

3. Georg Kleinpeter. He was the husband of Marg. Judith (not 
legible). 

A. Franz (Francois) married 1823 Adelaide Traeger 

(Tegre). 

a. A. Cornelia married in 1855 William Stokes; 

b. Francis Amelia married 1856 Thomas Byrne. 

B. Julia married 1825 Jean Traeger (Tregre), son of Jean 

T. and Eva Ory. 



"The numbers, letters and distance from the margin indicate the differ- 
ent generations. 



\ The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 109 

! 

! C. Jean married 1825 Marie Rose Bouillon. 

I a. Elvira married 185 1 John Huguet; 

b. Carolina married 1859 Sam. McConnell; 
' c. Josiah married 1865 Elene Elder. 

4. Catharine Kleinpeter. She came with her husband, Emmerich 
Adam, from Maryland. 

A. Cath. Adam, baptized 1775, married 1795 Jacob Muel- 

ler, from Maryland; 

B. Eve Adam, bapt. 1777, married 1796 Johann Thomas, 

son of Henry Th. and Barbara Ory, from Maryland; 
a. Georg Thomas, bapt. 1808. 

C. Marie Adam married 1805 Georg Kraus, another Mary- 

lander's son; 

D. Mathias Adam, bapt. 1782 ; 

E. Michael Adam, bapt. 1788. 

5. Barbara Kleinpeter. She was the wife of Jacob Schlatter, from 
Maryland. 

A. Cath. Schlatter, baptized 1777; 

B. Michael Schlatter married 18 14 Marie Jeanne Dar- 

denne, and, in 1820, Marie Pamela Hawkins. 

a. Ernestine Schlatter married 1830 James Robert- 

son; 

b. Michael Schlatter married 1843 Lodiska De- 

sobry. 

6. Eva Kleinpeter, the "native of Strassburg", married 1777 Jo- 
hann Rein ("Reine") "of America", which here stands for 
Maryland. Rein signed his name in German script, as did the 
Kleinpeters and the Ory family. 

The name Kleinpeter appears in the records sometimes in 
the spelling "Cloinpetre" and "Clampetre." De Bow's "Review" 
says (Vol. XL, 616) that Johann Georg Kleinpeter was the first 
to grow successfully sugar cane on the highlands. In 1790 he 
erected the first cotton gin, and his son, Johann Baptist Klein- 
peter, in 1832, erected the first steam sugar mill. 

The Ory Family. 
Another large German family from Maryland was that of 
NiKOLAus Ory^ whose wife was Anna Strassbach. She died 
in 1789, aged 72 years. All their children were born in Frederic 
county, Maryland. One of their sons, serving as a witness to 
a marriage in St. John the Baptist parish, signed his name in 
German script "Mattheis Ory, Zeig" (Zeuge^witness). 



no The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Children of Nikolaus Ory and Anna Strassbach. ' 

1. Mathias Ory (died 1820, aged 70 years). He married tw( 
months after the arrival of the Marylanders in Louisiana, oiii 
the nth of October, 1774, Agnes Weber (she died 1841),' 
daughter of Jean Weber and Weber and Cath. Traeger (Tre- 
gre), and left eleven children: 

A. Antoine Ory; 

B. Pierre Ory; 1 

C. Jean Louis Ory; \ 

D. Jean Eugene (Dry; 

E. Elie Ory; 

F. Francois Ory; 

G. Jean Baptiste Ory; 
H. Joseph Ory; 

I. Marie Rose Ory, who married 1798 Georg Kamper 

(Cambre) ; 
K. Magdalena Ory, who married 1819 Pierre Himmel 

(Hymel) ; 
L. Cath. Ory, who married 1813 Jean Bapt. Baudry. 

2. Johann Ory, married 1781 Eva Hofmann, daughter of Jacob 
H. and Sophie Jacob. By this his first wife he had eight 
children : 

A. Cath. Ory many 181 1 Francois Tircuit; 

B. Magdalena Ory married 1818 Denis Remondet; 

C. Louis Ory married 1814 Marie Picou; 

D. Marie Ory married 1814 Pierre Richard ; 

E. Nik. Ory married 1821 A. Delphine Bourg; 

a. Adele Ory married 1844 Pierre Savoy; 

b. Eugenie Ory married 1844 Paul Materne; 

F. Marianne Ory, baptized 1788; 

G. Pierre Ory, baptized 1788; 

H. Jean Baptist Ory married 1808 Magdalena Weber. 

In 1797 the same Johann Ory married Barbe 
Tircuit, from Canada, by whom he had five 
children more: 
I. Juan Alexis Ory, born 1800; 
K. Felicie Ory, born 1802; 

L. Emerente Ory, born 1805, married 1827 Eugene Mat- 
tern ; 
M. Francois Ory, born 1812, married 1827 M. Celestine 

Leche, daughter of Jean L. and Scholastica Keller ; 
N, Barbara Ory, born 1797, married 181 5 Jean Louis 
Deslattes. 

3. Louis Ory. He married in 1791 Margarethe Wichner (Vicner), 
daughter of Adam W. and Anna Maria Traeger (Tregre). He 
died in 1800. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana iii 

A. Nikolaus Ory married in 1817 Ursula Charleville; 

B. Michael Ory, baptized in 1797 ; 

C. Louis Ory married 1816 Genevieve Schaf (Chauffe) ; 
/ D. Jean Baptiste Ory, baptized 1793; 

E. Marguerite Ory who married Geo. Traeger (Tregre). 

' 4. Barbara Ory, the wife of Henry Thomas, from Maryland. 

A. Henry Thomas, baptized 1774, married 1800 Isabella 
Kleinpeter, daughter of Johann K. and Cath. Sharp. 

5. Magdalena Ory, the wife of Philipp Jacob Engelhardt, from 
Maryland. This name appears in official documents in the 

^\ spelling "Hingle Hart" and "Inglehart". 

6. Christine Ory, the wife of Nikolaus Mannhofer, from Mary- 
land. 

A. Marie Mannhofer married in 1778 Lorenz Fellmann, 
son of Jos. F. and Anna Wiedemann. The Fellmann 
family -still exists on Bayou Lafourche, but the name is 
now changed into "Falteman", though the progenitor 
of the family signed his name "Lorenz Fellmann". 

7. Christian Michel Ory. Nothing is known of him but his name. 
His daughter Elise married 1788 one Juan Georg. 

8. Catharine Ory, the wife of Paul Sharp, from Maryland. 

A. Magdalena Sharp married in 1796 Joseph Kleinpeter, 

son of Johann Georg Kleinpeter and his wife Ger- 
trude. 

B. Catharine Sharp married in 1781 Juan Petit Pier. 

The Creoles of German Descent. 

The descendants of the founders of the German Coast and 
the descendants of all other Germans who came to Louisiana 
before the year 1803 are the "Creoles of German Descent." 

Opinions as to the meaning of the word "Creole"^^ differ 
in Louisiana. All seem to agree that the first Louisiana Creole 
was born in Mobile in 1704 — the child of a French father, nation- 
ality of the mother unknown. According to the census of No- 
vember, 1707, the whole white population of Louisiana at that 
time consisted exclusively of people from France and French 
Canadians. 

In 1 719 the Germans began to arrive in Louisiana, and in- 

^ "The word Creole is supposed to be a negro corruption of the Spanish 
criadillo, diminutive of criado, a servant, follower, client; literally one bred, 
brought up." (^Century Dictionary.) In the Spanish West Indies the Euro- 
peans (Spaniards) ranked first, those born in the colony second. 



112 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

ternational marriages resulted. Now what was the status of th 
children born in Louisiana of German parents and of those chi' 
dren born from international marriages ? '^ 

Captain Bossu, a French officer, who, about 1750, lived in 
Louisiana for several years, gives the following definition : 

"We call Creoles the children born from a French father and 
a French or European mother," 

( 
Bossu thus msists upon the French nationality of the father 

but the mother may be either of French or of other European. 

nationality, including the German. This distinction excluded the 

children born in Louisiana of German parents and those children 

of international marriages where the father was not a French,- 

man. . |;, 

But international marriages and the marriages of inter- 
national children back into pure French families soon became 
so numerous that the French nationality of the father, demanded 
by Bossu, could no longer be insisted upon, and hence the children 
of the Germans had to be admitted into full membership among 
the Creoles. 

Incontestible testimony for this interpretation is furnished 
by the Chevalier Guy Soniat Dufossat, a French nobleman, a 
marine officer, who came to Louisiana in 1751 and became the 
founder of the Soniat Dufossat family in Louisiana, His testi- 
mony, being that of a man who resided permanently in Louis- 
iana, is undoubtedly more reliable than that of Bossu, who was 
but a transient observer. 

Chevalier Soniat Dufossat says in his "Synopsis of the His- 
tory of Louisiana," page 29 : 

"Creoles are defined to be the children of Europeans born in 
the colony." 

This includes the children born of GeiTnan parents in Louis- 
iana. 

In 1765 and 1766 the Acadians came into the colony. They 
were descendants of Frenchmen who had emigrated to Canada. 
As Canada was a French colony, the Acadians were Creoles long 
before the first Louisiana Creole was born in Mobile. Being 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 113 

very ignorant and simple, however, although good people, the 
Acadians were not called Creoles in Louisiana, and not consid- 
ered their equals by the Louisiana Creoles; for the Louisiana 
Creoles, at least in part, were descendants of officials of the king 
and of the Compagnie des Indes, and of officers, some of whom 
were members of noble families, whose family records date back 
to the time of the crusades. In their circles, as elegant education 
and as fine manners were to be found as in Paris. 

Although the Acadians furnished Louisiana a number of ex- 
cellent men, such as Governor Mouton, Chief Justice Poche, and 
others, and although there are family connections between them 
and the other Creoles, still the majority of the Acadians form a 
more or less separate caste, and are called to the present day 
"Cajuns." 

In 1769 the Spaniards came. Between them and the Louis- 
ana Creoles there was in the beginning the bitterest hatred. 
Later, however, came an era of reconciliation, during which the 
Spaniards, especially a considerable number of Spanish officers, 
married into Creole families. This disarmed the hatred, and the 
descendants of the Spaniards are now also considered Creoles. 

With the year 1803, however, with the sale of Louisiana to 
the United States, the admission of new elements of the popula- 
tion into the Creole class ceased. Louisiana was now no longer 
a colony, and the large immigration setting in at that time from 
the United States into Louisiana did not come from Europe. 
The descendants of the Americans are therefore not called 
Creoles. 

Yet the Americans continued to use the word "Creole" for 
commercial purposes, and to apply it to everything coming from 
Louisiana, negroes, animals, and goods of all kinds. "Creole 
negroes" are negroes born in Louisiana ; and we hear likewise of 
"Creole chickens," "Creole eggs/' "Creole ponies," "Creole 
cows," "Creole butter," and so forth. As a trade mark "Creole" 
signifies the home-raised or home-made, the better and fresher 
goods in contrast to those imported from the West, from the 
North, or from Europe. 

After what has been said, we may now proceed to define the 
word "Creole :" 



114 ^^^ Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Creoles are the descendants of the white people who emi- 
grated from Europe to Louisiana during the colonial period, i. e., 
before 1803; ^^^ ^^^ properly only those horn within the limits 
of the original territory of Louisiana. 

Great stress is to be laid on the word "white," as there are 
many persons, especially in other parts of the United States, who, 
from lack of better information, suspect the Louisiana Creoles 
of having in their veins a tincture of African or of Indian blood, 
possibly both, along with the Caucasion. Such a suspicion may 
be justified as regards the Spanish Creoles of the West Indies, 
Central America, Mexico, and South America, for the Spanish 
colonists there did not always preserve the purity of their race. 

But Louisiana was a French colony, where, as early as 
1724, the celebrated "Black Code" was promulgated, which regu- 
lated the relations between the whites and the blacks, forbade 
marriages between them, and imposed heavy fines for violations. 
Even sexual intercourse outside of marriage was forbidden; and 
when a negress, a slave, had a child by her white master, the 
master had to pay a fine of 300 livres, and the negress with 
her child became the property of the hospital of New Orleans. 
In addition to the legal punishment, such connections were always 
followed by social ostracism and the refusal of the family to 
recognize the issue of such marriages and illicit relations ; and to 
the present day every Creole family will absolutely refuse to 
receive any person on terms of equality whose family at any 
time, no matter how remote, was tainted by the blood of the 
black race. It is true that there are many colored people in 
Louisiana who bear names of Creole families, but this can, in 
many instances, be explained by the fact that slaves voluntarily 
freed by their owners, often adopted the family names of their 
former masters. 

The definition of the word "Creole" given above is further 
supported by what Gayarre says : 

"Creoles we call the children of European parents in Spanish 
or French colonies." 

That some of the Creoles of the present generation are not 
satisfied with the author's definition was shown in 1886, when 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 115 

n attempt was made to found a "Creole Association" in New 

)rleans, upon which occasion it became necessary to define the 

/ord "Creole." 

Henry Rightor in his "Standard History of New Orleans," 

•age 195, says that he found in the papers of this association, 
hich has since been dissolved, two definitions which undoubtedly 
present the views of the founders of the "Creole Association." 
he first one is : 

"The Louisiana Creole is one who is a descendant of the origi- 
n-al settlers in Louisiana under the French and Spanish govern- 
rr^ents, or, generally, one born in Louisiana of European parents, 
aiid whose mother-tongue is French." 

As this definition, however, would have excluded the de- 
s* :endants of the Spanish colonists, who preserved their mother- 
tcpngue, a second attempt at a definition seems to have been 
miade: 

"A native descendant of European parents speaking French or 
->anish." 



»^ 



i 



di 



It is, therefore, intended now to make the preservation of 
e mother-tongue the test, and the vice-president of the "Creole 
^association" made this clear when he, in the absence of the presi- 
ent. Chief Justice Poche, said in his inauguration speech : 

"Let no man, repudiating the tongue in which his first prayers 
fere lisped, join us." 

If this view, to determine one's descent by the adherence 

the mother-tongue, were correct, nothing could be said against 

[ailing now, as some partisans really do, all Creoles "French 

Veoles," for all Creoles speak French now. But then the ques- 

on would necessarily occur: 

What, then, if the descendants of the present Creoles in 
fty, or one hundred years from now should no longer speak 
rench, but English? Will there then be no more Creoles? 

It stands to reason that one's mother-tongue cannot decide 

e question of one's descent. The mother-tongue never decides 

[n matters of descent. In a succession case no judge would ever 

hink of basing his decision upon the mother-tongue of the claim- 



i 



' 



ii6 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

ants, and of the many millions of people who immigrated f ron i 
Europe to the United States no descendant ever forfeited hi: 5 
right of inheritance on account of his having adopted English, 
in place of the mother-tongue of his family. 

In matters of descent not the language but the hlood is the- 
vital matter, and the blood alone. We must therefore classify j 
the Louisiana Creoles according to the blood of their progenitors, 
and say: 

There are 

Creoles of French descent, 

Creoles of German descent, 

Creoles of Spanish descent, 
and still others, for instance Creoles of Irish descent (the Mc'.;' 
Carty family) and Creoles of Scotch descent (the Pollocl;'.; 
family). 

What is the Probable Number of the Creoles of Germanj ? 

Descent ? ^ , 

This question may be answered in the words of the promise? 
given to Abraham: they are as numerous "as the sands on the seaj\ 
shore." 'l 

^ 

The church registers of St. John the Baptist prove that thed * 
German pioneers were blessed with enormously large families.!" 1 
It seems that heaven wanted to compensate them in this manneir , 
for the many dear ones they had lost in the ports of France, orj 
the high seas, in Biloxi, and during the first period of their set- ^ 
tling in Louisiana. I found fourteen of them, sixteen, eighteen 
and once even twenty-two children in a family.;' 

Yet, in spite of this great number of children there was nc 
difficulty in providing for the numerous daughters. There was' 
a great scarcity of women in Louisiana in early times. Indeed, 
as we have seen, prostitutes were gathered in Paris and sentji 
to Louisiana to provide wives for the colonists. Few of these' 
lewd women ever had any children, and their families became 
extinct in the second and third generation. See census of 1721*; 
where it is stated that fourteen soldiers were married but that, 
there was not a single child in these fourteen families. / 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 117 

According to this census — when the Germans on the German 
Coast and those on the Arkansas River were not enumerated — 
there were only thirty women with 21 children for every hundred 
white men in the district of New Orleans. No wonder that the 
young Frenchmen, especially those of the better class, chose wives 
from among the German maidens, who were not only morally 
and physically sound and strong, but had also been reared by 
their German mothers to be good house-wives. 

Of the Heidel (Hay del) family, whose descendants are so 
numerous that one of them told the writer: "My family alone 
can populate a whole parish (county) in Louisiana," female de- 
scendants of the first five generations married into seventy-four 
different French families, and it very seldom happened that there 
was but one marriage between two families. Remember that in 
these statistics are still wanting the entries of the many registers 
that were burned at the "Red Church" and those of the volumes 
burned with the cathedral of New Orleans in 1788. 

Yes, even into the most exclusive circles, into the families 
of the officials and of the richest merchants the German girls 
married, they became the wives of French and Spanish officers 
of ancient nobility in whose descendants German blood still flows. 

Only one example: female descendants of Karl Friedrich 
D'Arensbourg married into the families of de la Chaise, de la 
Tour, de la Grue, de Villere, de L'Home, de Vaugine, d'Olhond, 
Laland d'Apremont, de Bosclair, de Livaudais, de Blanc, de la 
Barre, de Lery, de la Vergne, de Buys, Forstall, Trudeau, Ferret, 
St. Martin, Montegut, Lanaux, Beauregard, Bouligny, Suze- 
neau, le Breton, Tricou, Duverje, Urquhart, de Reggio, Rath- 
bone, Durel, Luminals, Bermudez. 

When General O'Reilly, in the year 1769, forced the Spanish 
yoke upon Louisiana, he selected six of the most prominent citi- 
zens, whom he had shot in order to intimidate the hostile popu- 
lation. Of these six "martyrs of Louisiana," were not fewer 
than three who had wives from German families : 

Joseph Milhet^ the richest merchant of the colony, had 
as his wife Margarethe Wiltz, whose father was from Eisenach, 
in Thuringia, while her mother was born in Frankenthal, Saxony ; 



ii8 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Marquis^ the commander-in-chief of the insurgents, was 
married to a daughter of an Alsatian officer, Gregor Volant, from 
Landsee, near Strassburg, and 

Joseph de Villere, under whose command the Germans 
of the German Coast had marched against the Spanish in 1768, 
had a grandchild of Karl Friedrich D'Arensbourg as his wife. 

The German Language Among the Creoles of Louisiana. 

As a rule, the German girls took German husbands, and 
whole families married into one another. To give but one ex- 
ample, it may be mentioned here that out of the ten children 
of one Jacob Troxler not fewer than eight married into the 
Heidel (Hay del) family. In such families the German lan- 
guage survived longest, and old Creoles of German descent have 
told me that their grandparents still understood and were able 
to speak the German language, although they were not able to 
read and write it, as there were never any German teachers on 
the German coast. I myself found among the old records a 
building contract of 1763 written in German, in which one 
Andreas Bluemler, a carpenter, obligated himself to build "for 
2000 livres and a cow, a heifer and a black calf," a house for 
Simon Traeger (Tregre). A law-suit followed and so this 
building contract, together with the court records of the case 
were preserved to the present day. 

In consequence, however, of the many family ties between 
the Germans and the French, and in consequence of the custom 
of the Creoles to marry into related families, French gradually 
became the family language even in those German families 
which had preserved the German language during three genera- 
tions. 

Some few German words, however, can occasionally be heard 
even yet in the Creole families of German descent, especially 
words relating to favorite dishes, "which our grandmother was 
still able to cook, but which are no longer known in our families." 

German names of persons, too, have been preserved, al- 
though in such a mutilated form that they can hardly be recog- 
nized. Thus the tradition in the Heidel (Haydel) family is that 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 119 

the first Heidel born in Louisiana was called "Anscopp," with 
the French nasal pronunciation of the first syllable. I could not 
get the original German for "Anscopp" until I compiled the 
genealogy of the family when I found that the first Heidel born 
in Louisiana was christened "J^^^^ Jacques." Now I knew that 
they called him in the family "Hans Jacob," and that by throwing 
out the initial "h" and contracting "Hans Jacob" the name was 
changed into "Anscopp." In a similar manner "Hans Peter" was 
changed into "Ampete" and "Hans Adam" in to "Ansdam." 

The German language disappeared quickest in families 
where a German had married a French girl. There no German 
was spoken at all, and even the Christian names customary in 
German families disappeared even as early as in the second gen- 
eration, as now also the French wife and her relatives had to 
be considered in the giving of names to the children. Instead 
of Hans Peter, Hans Jacob, Michl, Andre, and Matthis, the 
boys of the German farmers were now called : Sylvain, Honore, 
Achille, Anatole, Valcourt, Lezin, Ursin, Marcel, Symphorion, 
Homer, Ovide, Onesiphore, and Onesime; and instead of the 
good old German names Anna Marie, Marianne, Barbara, Kath- 
arine, Veronika, and Ursula, the German girls were called : Hor- 
tense, Corinne, Elodie, Euphemie, Felicite, Melicerte, Desire, 
Pelagic, Constance, Pamela; and after the French revolution 
each family had her "Marie Antoinette." 

The Fate of the German Family Names Among the 

Creoles. 

The changes which the German family names underwent 
among the Creoles are most regrettable. Without exception, all 
names of the first German colonists of Louisiana were changed, 
and most of the Creoles of German descent at the present time 
no longer know how the names of their German ancestors looked. 
Sometimes they were changed beyond recognition, and only by 
tracing some thirty families with all their branches through all 
the church records still available ; by going through eighty boxes 
of official documents in the keeping of the "Louisiana Historical 
Society;" by ransacking the archives of the city of New Orleans 



I20 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

and of a number of country parishes, and by compiling the gene- 
alogies of these families has the author been able to recognize the 
German people of the different generations, to ascertain their 
original names, and to connect the old German settlers with the 
generation of the Creoles of German descent now living. 

Various circumstances contributed to the changing of these 
names. The principal one was, no doubt, the fact that some of 
the old German colonists were not able to write their names. 
Their youth had fallen into the period of the first fifty years 
after the "Thirty Years' War" and into the last years of the 
war when the armies of Louis XIV of France devastated the 
Palatinate. In consequence of the general destruction and the 
widespread misery of that period, schools could hardly exist in 
their homes. It was therefore not the fault of these people if 
they could not read and write their names. Moreover, as the 
parents could not tell their children in Louisiana how to write 
their names, these children had to accept what French and Span- 
ish teachers and priests told them, and what they found in official 
documents. But French and Spanish officials and priests heard 
the German names through French and Spanish ears, and wrote 
them down as they thought these sounds should be written in 
French or Spanish. Moreover, Spanish and French officials and 
priests at that early time were not great experts in the grammar 
of their own language. 

Finally, the early German colonists did not pronounce their 
own names correctly, but according to their home dialect. 

To prove the last assertion three German names shall be 
considered: "Schaf," "Schoen," "Mans." In South Germany, 
where most of these people came from, "a" is pronounced broad, 
and almost approaches the "o." The South German peasant 
does not say "meine Schafe," but "mei' Schof." No wonder that 
the French officials spelled the name "Schaf" "Chaufife." In this 
form the name still exists in Louisiana. 

"Schoen" was evidently pronounced like German "Schehn," 
for which reason the French spelled it "Chesne," "Chaigne," and 
"Chin." 

And the name "Manz" for the same reason was changed into 
"Montz." 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 121 

Many changes in the spelling of the German names follow 
|:he general "Law of the mutation of Consonants," called Grimm's 
-aw, which may be roughly stated thus : "Consonants uttered by 
he same organ of speech are frequently interchanged." 

Lip sounds: b, p, v, f, ph, (English) gh (as in the word 
'enough") ; 

Tongue sounds: d, t, s, z, sch, (French) ch, che, c, and x; 
Throat sounds: g, k, ch, hard c, qu, (French) gu, (Spanish) 
and X. 

Original German 
form of name: 

eber .changed into Veber, Vebre, Vever, Bevre, 

Febre, Webere, Febore, Vabure, Weibre, 
Weyber, Febore and now "Webre". 

remser Chremser. 

amper Kammer, Campert, Camper, Campfer, Cam- 
bra (Spanish) and now "Cambre". 

Irebs Creps. 

*'indler Kindeler, Quindler, Quinler. 

Werner Cairne, Kerne, Querne, Kerna, Carnel, Quer- 

nel. 

Cindermann Quinderman, Quindreman. 

"lemens Clement. 

uerckel Pircle, Percle, Bercle, Birquelle, Pircli, 

Lerkle and Percler. 

One Marianne Buerckel married one 
"Don Santiago Villenol". As the bride- 
groom's own signature proves, the man's 
name was not "Santiago Villenol" but 
"Jacob Wilhelm Nolte". 

uchwalter Bucvalter, Bouchevaldre, Boucvaltre. 

[/illig Willique, Villique, Vilic, Villig, Billic, Velyk. 

Latzenberger Katcebergue, Kastzeberg, Cazverg, Casverg, 

Casberg, Cazimbert, Kalsberke, Casver- 
gue, Castleberg, Katsberk, Cazenbergue 
and now "Casbergue". 

Vichner Wichnaire, Vicner, Vicnaire, Vickner, Vig- 

nel, Vichneair, Vighner, Vequenel, Vicg- 
ner, Vigner, Vuquiner, Bicner, Vixner, 
Wiener, Wickner. 

In an entry in the marriage register of 
1 79 1, which four members of this family 
signed, the name Wichner is spelled dif- 
ferently five times, as the officiating 
priest, too, had his own way of spelling 
it. 



122 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 



Wagensbach Vagensbach, Wagenspack, Wagenpack, Vag. 

lespaque, Vaverspaqhez, Waiwaipack 
Wabespack, Bangepach, Varesbach, Vac' 
bach, Wabespack, Woiguespack, Woi 
wioguespack, Vacheba, Vacquensbac • 
Weghisbogh and now "Waguespack". 

Trischl Tris, Trisch and now "Triche". 

Traeger Draeger, Tregle, Graeber, Trecle, Traigle 

Treigle, Treguer, Draigue, Dreikei 
Draeguer, and now "Tregre". ) 

Ettler Etlair, Edeler, Edler, Ideler, Heidler, Idelet 

Edtl. 

Johannes Ettler used to add to hi ' 
signature "from Colmar", From th' 
came "dit Colmar", "alias Colmar", an* 
when his daughter Agnes Ettler diet 
she was entered into the death registe , 
of St. John the Baptist "Ines Colmar' i 

Foltz Foltse, Faulse, Foist, Folet, Folch, Folsl ' 

Poltz, Fols and now "Folse". 

Manz Mans, Mons, Monces, Months, Munts an 

now "Montz". ' • 

Wilsz Wils, Vils, Willst, Vills, Vylzt, Vylts, Wuell T 

Bilce, Veilts. The Wilsz family in Eisc \ 
nach, Thuringia, Germany, writes th.r- 
name with "sz", and so did Ludwi* I ^ 
Wilsz, the progenitor of the Ne" \ » 
Orleans branch of the family, but hi i' \ 
brother in Mobile adopted "tz" as di I f 
all descendants of both branches, in f .1 
eluding Governor Wiltz of Louisiana. ' * 

Lesch Leche, Laiche, Lesc, Leichet, Lecheux an , 1, 

now "Leche" and "Laiche". *■ \ 

Zehringer Seringuer, Sering, Seringue, Zerinck, Zeii /" ■ 

incque, Ceringue and now "Zeringue". 

Huber Houbre, Houber, Houver, Ubre, Ouuer 

Ouvre, Houvre, Hoover, Vbre an , 1 
Vbaire. In "Vbre" and "Vbaire" th \ 
"V" stands for "U". \ 



V. 



Initial "h" is prounounced neither in French nor in Spanisl" 
For this reason initial "h" in German names was usually droppec 
and where an attempt was made to represent it, the French ofte 
used "k," while the Spaniards represented it by *'x" or "j," an. 
occasionally by "qu." 

Heidel changed into..Aydel, Jaidel, Keidel. Appears also as He 

delle, Idel, Etdell and is now "Haydel' 
Richner Rixner, Risner, Resquiner, Ristener. 



\ 



\ 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 123 

I Himmel Immel, Ymelle, Ximel, Quimel and now 

"Hymel". 

Wichner Vixner. 

Heifer Elfer, Elf re, Elfert. 

Hufnagel Oufnague, Houfnack. 

Hauser Hoser, Oser. 

When a German name began with a vowel they often pre- 
fixed an "h" : 

Engel Engle, Aingle, Ingle, Yngle, Hingel, Hincle, 

Hengel, Heigne and now "Hingle". 

Engelhardt Hingle Hart, Hanglehart, Inglehart. 

Edelmeier Heldemaire, Aidelmer, Eldemere, Delmaire, 

Le Maire. 

, In Spanish the letter "1" occurs sometimes when we expect 

an "r," for instance "Catalina" for "Catherina." So the Spanish 
I use "1" also in family names instead of "r" : 

I Quernel instead of Kerner, 

? Beltram for Bertram, 

Viquinel and Vignel for Vicner (Wichner), 
Tregle for Traeger (Tregre). 

By replacing German "sch" by "ch," as was the custom 
(' during the French period, the German names assumed an entirely 
foreign appearance, as no German word ever begins with "ch" : 

; Schantz Chance and Chans ; 

Strantz Schrantz, Chrence ; 

Schwab Chave and Chuabe, Chuave ; 

Schaf Chaufif, Cuave, Cheauf, Chof, Chofe, Choff, 

Chaaf, Soff, Shoff, Skoff, Shaw, Chaaf 
and now "Chauffe"; 

I Schaefer Chefer, Cheffre, Chevre, Chepher, Cheper, 

il Scheve. 

Schmidt Chemitt and Chmid ; 

(, Schuetz Chutz. 

|f The German "o" became "au" and "eau" : 

i Vogel Fogle, Feaugle, Voguel, and Fauquel. 

I Hofmann Ofman, Aufman, and Eaufman. 

Also the inclination of the French to put the stress upon 
! the last syllable appears in German names : 

I Himmel Ymelle; 

I Heidel Aydelle, Hedelle, Haydelle, Etdelle. 

I Rommel Rommelle. Appears also in the forms Romm- 

' le, Romle, Rome, Romo (Spanish), 

Romme, Rom. 



124 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Other Interesting Changes. ^ 

Troxler changed into . . Stroxler, Stroscler, Drozeler, Troesscler, 

Troxlaire, Drotseler, Trocsler, Trucks- ' 
ler, Trouchsler, Troustre, Troseler, 
Trocler, Trossclaire, Troseler, Trocher, . 
Drotzeler, Droezler, Troxclair, Tros- 
lisser. 

Kuhn Coun, Cohn, Koun. 

Mayer Mayre, Mailer, Mahir, Mahier, Maieux, ; 

Meyier, Mayeux. 

Dubs Tus, Touptz, Toubse, Toupse, Tups, now 

"Toups". 

Ory Orji, Oray, Orij, Haury, Aury. 

Keller Queller, Caler, Keler, Quellar. One "Don 

Juan Pedro Cuellar" signed his name in 
German script "Hansbeter Keller", 

Held Haid, Helder, Helette, Hail, Helle, Helte. 

Steilleder Stelider, Steilledre, Stillaitre, Stillaite, Stilet, j 

Estilet, Steili, Steli now "Estilet". | 

Steiger Stayer, Stabler, Sther, Stay re, Steili, Stayer, i 

Steygre, Estaidre. / 

Jansen Yentzen, Hentzen, Kensin. ' 

Kleinpeter Cloinpetre, Clampetre. j 

Ketterer Quaitret. i 

Hans Erich Roder. . . Anseriquer Auder. I 

Weisskraemer Visecrenne. 

Struempfl Strimber, Estrenfoul. 

Hansjoerg Hensiery. 

Graef(in) Crevine. 

Kissinger Guzinguer, Quisingre. 

Urban Ohnesorg Hour Pamonscaurse. 

Dorothea Baer (in) , . .Torotay Perrinne. 

Miltenberger Mil de Bergue. 

Christmann Crestman, Yresman, Krestman. 

Wenger Vinguer. 

Bendernagel Bintnagle. 

Wehrle Verlet, Verlay. 

Schoderbecker Chelaudtre, Chloterberk. 

Renner Rinher. 

Also 'Christian names as well as the names of places (see 
Ettler, from Colmar) and nicknames became family names. 

The daughter of one Jacob Heifer was entered into the 
marriage register as "Mademoiselle Yocle," because her father 
was called familiarly "Jockel," which is a nickname for Jacob. 

The family of Thomas Lesch was for some time lost to 
me until I recovered it under the name of "Daumas"="Thomas." 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 125 

Remarkable was the fate of the name "Hofmann." The 
forms Of man, Aufman, Eaufman, Haufman, Ophman, Oghman, 
Ocman, Hochman, Haukman, Hacmin, Aupemane, Augman, 
Olphman, and Ocmane were not the only changes that occurred. 
The family came from Baden and thus "de Bade" was often 
added to the name. In course of time the people forgot the 
meaning of "de Bade," and a new name was formed, "Badeau," 
with a feminine form, "Badeauine." 

The eldest daughter of one Hofmann married a man by the 
name of "Achtziger." This name seems to have given a great deal 
of trouble. I found "Hacksiger," "Chactziger," "Oxtiger," "Ox- 
tixer," "Axtigre," "Harzstingre," "Astringer," "Haxsitper," and 
"Horticair," but early the French officials (like in the case "Zweig- 
Labranche") translated the name Achtziger into French "Ouatre- 
vingt," to which they were in the habit of adding the original 
name as best they knew how. Now, as the eldest daughter of this 
Hofmann was called "Madame Quatrevingt," they seem to have 
called her younger sister in a joking way "Mademoiselle Quar- 
ante," for when she married she appears in the church register as 
"Mademoiselle Quarantine," alias "Hocman." 

Finally, another name shall be mentioned here, which is now 
pronounced "Sheckshnyder." The legend is that six brothers 
by the name of "Schneider" came across the sea, and each one 
of them was called "one of the six Schneiders," hence the name 
"Sheckshnyder;" but this legend is, like many another legend, 
false. The first priest of St. John the Baptist, the German Ca- 
puchin father Bernhard von Limbach (1772), who wrote even 
the most difficult German names phonetically correct, entered 
the name as "Scheckschneider," which is an old German name. 
The progenitor of this family, Hans Reinhard Scheckschneider, 
is mentioned on the passenger list of one of the four pest ships 
which sailed from L'Orient on the twenty-fourth of January, 
1 72 1. There were no "six Schneider" on board, only he, his 
wife and two sons, one of whom died in Brest. Yet he was al- 
ready called "Chezneider," even on board ship. From this came 
later the following forms, which were all taken from official 
documents : 



126 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

Sexchneyder, Sexnaidre, Snydre, Sixtaillenr, Seckshneyder, 
Secxnauder, Sheknaidre, Seinadre, Seicnaydre, Schnaidre, Seic- 
shnaydre, Seishaudre, Schgnaidre, Seinaydre, Scheixneydre, 
Sixney, Sexnall, Chesnaitre, Caxnayges, Cheixnaydre, Chex- 
naydre, Ceixnaidre, Chixnaytre, Segsneidre, Cheesnyder, Celf- 
ceneidre, Hexnaider. At present almost every branch of this 
very numerous family writes the name differently. 

German Names in the Spanish Marriage Register of St. John 

the Baptist. 




















The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 127 

Free translation: On the 21st of February 1785 Anton 
Weber, legitimate son of John Weber and Cath. Traeger 
(Tregre), married Cath. Scheckschneider, legitimate daughter 
of John Adam Scheckschneider and Agnes Mayer. Witnesses : 
Domingo Guide, Mathias Ory and Fred. Bertram. 

Frater Francesco, Notario. 

CONCLUSION. 

The Creoles of German descent constitute even now a 
large, if not the largest, part of the white population of the Ger- 
man Coast, the parishes of St. Charles and St. John the Baptist, 
of Louisiana. But they spread at an early time, also, over 
neighboring districts, where their many children took up new 
lands for cultivation. 

They went up to St. James parish, where some connected 
themselves with the Acadian families by marriages. They also 
went to the parishes of Assumption, Ascension, and Iberville, 
still further up the Mississippi. They went to where Donald- 
sonville now stands. On that place was the village of the Chet- 
imachas Indians; and Bayou Lafourche, which there branches 
off from the Mississippi and extends for a distance of no miles 
to the Gulf of Mexico, was then called "Fourche des Cheti- 
machas." 

Down this bayou the descendants of the early Germans 
pressed and throughout the whole length of Bayou Lafourche I 
found many German names in the church registers of Donald- 
sonville, Paincourtville, Plattenville, Napoleonville, Labadieville, 
Thibodeaux, Houma and Lockport. Also the word "Teche" 
(Bayou Teche) is supposed to be derived from "Deutsch." 

In the course of time, however, great changes have occur- 
red among the descendants of the early Germans, though not 
so much in their physical appearance. There are still among 
them many of the ancient stalwart German type, who betray the 
French blood received in the course of time only by their more 
lively disposition; the^f^re still blue eyes and blond hair among 
them, although in some families both types, the German and the 
Latin, seem to be equally represented ; there is still the same very 



128 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

large number of children to be found in their families; the Cre- 
ole of German descent is still the most robust of the Creoles, 
and one very well known family still produces the same giants 
as in the days when their German great-grandfathers used to 
drive ofif the Acadians, when they came down from St. James 
to disturb the Saturday dances on the German Coast. 

The changes spoken of refer chiefly to their economical 
condition. Through the Civil War many of these families lost not 
only their slaves, but also their plantations, the source of their 
once very considerable wealth. They have, therefore, shared the 
lot of the other Creoles. But, thanks to their inherited energy, 
they wrung an existence from the adverse conditions, and now 
that a new era of prosperity has dawned upon Louisiana, their 
prospects, too, have become brighter — many of them are now 
to be found in the professions, in commercial and industrial pur- 
suits, and in official positions all over the State, in which they 
have invariably gained for themselves an enviable reputation, 
and often great distinction; others made use of their knowledge 
of planting by accepting after the war positions of managers of 
large estates, later renting and finally buying some of the many 
vacant plantations, and still others succeeded in preserving and 
increasing the ante bellum wealth of their families. The great 
majority of the Creoles of German descent may be said to be 
again on the road to prosperity. 

But their golden age is passed, and will never return in the 
form in which they once enjoyed it. This they know, and for 
this reason their mind, especially that of the older generation, 
reverts with tender regret to the past. They also still remember 
their German descent, and when they now look sadly upon the 
land which their ancestors had conquered from the wilderness 
and the Mississippi, and which also once belonged to them, but 
which is now tilled by others, they still say with pride : 

"We are the descendants of those Germans who 
turned the wilderness into a paradise such as lou- 
isiana never possessed before," 

May they ever remember their German ancestors and emulate 
their example ! 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 129 

Official Acknowledgment 

OF THE 

Worth and Value of the German Pioneers of Louisiana. 

Laussat^ colonial prefect of Louisiana and commissioner of 
the French government in 1803, wrote the following letter: 

New Orleans, Messidor 6th. Eleventh Year.'^a 

The Colonial Prefect of Louisiana 
to Citizen Chaptal, 

Minister of the Interior. 

Citizen Minister: 

I received the letter of the 4th of Floreal of this year by which 
your Excellency deigned to consult me on the project of embarking 
German laborers for Louisiana. 

This is a project which sfiould be made a regular system by the 
French government for several years if it wants to derive profit 
from this country and to preserve it. 

Its present condition and its wretched {miserable) population 
demand this imperatively. This class of peasants, and especially of 
that nationality, is just the class we need and the only one which 
always achieved perfect success in these parts. 

What is called here the "German Coast" is the most industrious 
{la plus industrieuse) , the most populous (la plus peuplee), the 
most at ease (la plus aisee), the most upright (la plus honnete), the 
most respected (la plus estimee) part of the inhabitants of this 
colony. 

I regard it as essential that the French government should make 
it a rule to send every year from one thousand to twelve hundred 
families of the frontier departments of Switzerland, the Rhine and 
Holland; the emigrants of our southern provinces are not worth 
anything (n'y valent rien). 

Laussat. 

(£.venements de 1803, page 315. New Transcripts of the 
Louisiana Historical Society.) 

**«The month of Messidor was the harvest month. It began on the 
19th of June and ended on the i8th of July. The eleventh year was the 
year 1803. 



APPENDIX. 



The German Waldeck Regiment 

and 

The Sixtieth or "Royal American Regiment on Foot" 

in the War of 1779 to 1781. 

Although not bearing on the history of the settlement of the 
German Coast of Louisiana, a short account is added here of the 
part which the German Waldeck regiment and the 60th or Royal 
American regiment took in the Anglo-Spanish War of 1779- 
178 1. This war belongs to the colonial history of Louisiana; 
and as this work deals with the Germans of that period, the Ger- 
man soldier who fought on Louisiana soil in colonial times and 
there, no doubt, also met the German pioneer, may justly claim 
some space in this book. 

During the War of Independence England secured from 
some of the smaller principalities of Germany auxiliary troops 
which fought on the English side. There was no political alli- 
ance between these principalities and England, it was traffic in 
human flesh, pure and simple. England rented these troops to 
fight for her, paid a good rental for them, and a fixed price for 
every soldier killed or wounded. To the honor of the great ma- 
jority of the German monarchs be it said that they strongly dis- 
approved of this traffic, and that the King of Prussia openly 
favored the American cause and forbade the English auxiliary 
troops to march through his kingdom. 

There were 29,166 German soldiers in the English army: 

Hesse-Cassel furnished 16,992 men of whom she lost 6,500; 

Brunswick " 5,723 " " " " " 3,015; 

Hanau " 2,422 " " " " " 981; 

Ansbach Bayreuth " 1,644 " " " " " 461; 

Waldeck " 1,225 " " " " " 720; 

Anhalt-Zerbst " 1,160 " " " " " 176; 

29,166 11,853 

(131) 



132 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

The very great loss in men was due in part to the fact that 
a great number of these German soldiers, on coming into con- 
tact with the Germans living in America, who were loyal Amer- 
icans, and of whom many thousands fought in the revolutionary 
army under Washington, were persuaded to abandon the English 
cause and settled in this country. 

In May, 1779, hostilities broke out between Spain and Eng- 
land; and the boundary line between the English and the Span- 
ish possessions in America — the Mississippi River, Bayou Man- 
chac, the Amite River, and Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain — 
became a scene of war, and some of the principal actors were 
German troops. 

The English held Fort Panmure, where Natchez now 
stands ; a post on Thompson's Creek, near the present Port Hud- 
son; Fort New Richmond, now Baton Rouge; Fort Bute, on 
the Mississippi, at the entrance into Bayou Manchac; a post on 
the Amite River, presumably "French Settlement," below the 
confluence of Bayou Manchac and Amite River and Big Colyell 
Creek and Amite River; Mobile, and Pensacola. In order to 
strengthen these positions the English sent some of their auxil- 
iary troops, the German Waldeck regiment, from New York by 
way of Jamaica to Pensacola, where they landed on the twenty- 
ninth of January, 1779. 

Here the Waldeckers met a company of German recruits 
belonging to the i6th regiment, eight companies of the "Royal 
American Regiment on Foot," also known as the 60th English 
regiment, and some royalists from Maryland and Pennsylvania. 

The 60th regiment was raised by order of the Parliament in 
1755- "The men were chiefly Germans and Swiss who had set- 
tled in America. They were all zealous Protestants and, in gen- 
eral, strong, hardy men, accustomed to the American climate and, 
from their religion, language and race particularly proper to op- 
pose the French. "^^ As they could not speak English, however, 
it became necessary to grant commissions to a number of foreign 
Protestants who had served abroad as officers or engineers and 



" J. G. Rosengarten : The German Soldier in the Wars of the United 
States; Philadelphia, 1890, pages 15 to 24. 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 133 

spoke the German language. On the fifteenth of June, 1756, forty 
German officers came to America to serve in this regiment. The 
Rev. Michael Schlatter, the head of the Reformed German Church 
in America, was the chaplain of this regiment from 1756 to 1782. 
While in Pensacola, the 60th regiment still consisted "mainly of 
Germans." 

The English forces on the Mississippi being only 500 men, 
under Lieutenant Colonel Dickson, who urgently called for rein- 
forcements, part of the 60th regiment and the grenadier company 
of the Waldeckers left Pensacola for the Mississippi on the nine- 
teenth of June, 1779. On the second of August Major von Horn, 
with his company of Waldeckers and fifteen men of the company 
of Colonel Hanxleden, followed, and on the thirtieth of the same 
month another company of Waldeckers, that of Captain Alberti. 
They went by way of Lake Pontchartrain, Amite River and 
Bayou Manchac. 

The Spanish in New Orleans succeeded in capturing some 
of the English transports on Lake Pontchartrain, among which 
was the vessel which carried the company of Captain Alberti, 
who, with his officers, three sergeants, one drummer and forty- 
nine privates, was taken prisoner and brought to New Orleans, 
where he died of fever on the twenty-first of July, one day after 
Lieutenant von Goren had died of the same disease. 

On the twenty-second of August, 1779, the Spanish Gover- 
nor Galvez left New Orleans with a force of 1430 men and a 
small gun fleet to attack the English posts on the Mississippi. On 
his approach, the main force of the English withdrew towards 
Baton Rouge, leaving in Fort Bute Captain von Haake with a de- 
tachment of twenty Waldeckers. A recent history of Louisiana 
says that Galvez took this post by "assault," and even gives the 
name of the first Creole to enter the fort. There cannot have 
been much fighting at Fort Bute. From the fact that only eight 
prisoners were taken by Galvez, and the further fact that Captain 
von Haake later fought in Baton Rouge, it seems probable that 
this officer, on hearing of the large force marching against him, 
withdrew from Fort Bute, leaving a few men behind to make a 
show of resistance and hereby detain Galvez for a few days on 



134 ^^'^ Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

his march to Baton Rouge. In this they seem to have succeeded, 
as Galvez waited five days before ordering the "assault." 

Then he pressed on to Baton Rouge, which he also intended 
to take by assault; but after losing 500 men in the first, and 140 
in a subsequent assault in which he was even compelled to with- 
draw his batteries, he concluded to invest the post. Lieutenant 
Colonel Dickson was not prepared to resist a regular siege, and 
as many of his men were sick, an honorable surrender was ar- 
ranged. The English left Baton Rouge with all the honors of 
war, drums beating and banners flying. The prisoners were to 
be taken first to New Orleans and thence transported to New 
York, and were not to fight again within eighteen months. Every 
officer retained his sword and every man his private property. 

Of the Waldeckers two captains, three lieutenants, three 
surgeons, eight sergeants, six drummers, three servants, and 
176 privates surrendered in Baton Rouge. Ensign Nolting 
and one private fell. Lieutenant Leonhardi, who had dis- 
tinguished himself during the two assaults of the Spaniards, died 
of his wounds on the Mississippi while being conveyed to New 
Orleans. One surgeon, two non-commissioned officers and nine- 
teen privates died of their wounds ; and one officer and six privates 
were slightly wounded. Of the other troops fighting on the side 
of the English, 216 surrendered. 

From letters written by German officers, then prisoners of 
war in New Orleans, and from published diaries, we learn that 
many of the Waldeckers died in -this city, and that many were 
"still sick." Lieutenant Strubberg, in a letter to a brother officer 
in Pensacola, speaks very highly of Governor Galvez, who often 
invited the German officers to dinner, and even allowed them to 
visit their comrades in Pensacola. "The people of New Orleans, 
too," he says, "were very friendly and kind." 

Meanwhile, Governor Galvez went with a large fleet and a 
landing army to Mobile, which was ill prepared to resist an at- 
tack, and which surrendered after a breach had been made in the 
walls of the fort, on the fourteenth of March, 1780, before the 
men of the 60th regiment and the rest of the Waldeckers sent 
from Pensacola for the relief of that town could reach there. The 



The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 135 

relief column consisted of 522 men. It returned to Pensacola on 
the nineteenth of March. 

This expedition from Pensacola to Mobile — 72 miles in in- 
cessant rain and over soft soil, "not a human dwelling, and at 
night surrounded by wild beasts" — is described by the Waldeckers 
as one of their greatest hardships. They also complained of the 
poor fare in Pensacola. 

Chaplain Steuernagel writes: "In the morning we drink a 
glass of water and eat a piece of bread ; at noon we have nothing 
to drink but water, and our supper consists of a pipe of tobacco 
and a glass of water." A ham was sold for seven dollars, a 
pound of tobacco cost four dollars, a pound of coffee one dollar 
and a "Mass" (about one liter) of whiskey cost eight "Gulden 
schweres Geld." 

On the third of January, 1781, the English commander of 
Pensacola, Major General Campbell, ordered Colonel von Hanx- 
leden, of the Waldeckers, to proceed with one hundred men of 
the 60th regiment, eleven mounted Provincials, 300 Indians, and 
60 men of his own regiment, to the "French village on the Mis- 
sissippi" to drive the Spaniards out of their intrenchments. On 
this occasion the Waldeck troops consisted of Captain von Baum- 
bach, Lieutenants von Wilmowski and Stirling, ensign Ursal, 
six non-commissioned officers, two buglers, and forty-seven pri- 
vates. Colonel von Hanxleden arrived in front of the enemy on 
the seventh of January, and attempted to take the Spanish works 
by assault. The Spaniards resisted stubbornly, and although 
the Germans repeatedly attacked with their bayonets, their cour- 
age was in vain, as their force was too small and as the Indians 
could not support them effectively. Colonel von Hanxleden died 
a hero's death leading his men. Lieutenant Stirling and the Eng- 
lish Lieutenant Gordon fell, Captain von Baumbach and an offi- 
cer of the provincials were wounded, and so were many others. 
The Spaniards, too, lost heavily, and one of their magazines was 
set on fire. The body of Colonel von Hanxleden was hastily bur- 
ied under a large tree, and the Spaniards are said to have hon- 
ored the dead hero by putting a fence around his grave. 

The location of this battlefield is in doubt. The designation 



136 The Settlement of the German Coast of Louisiana 

"French village on the Mississippi" cannot be correct, for it 
would have taken Colonel von Hanxleden a great deal more than 
four days to reach the Mississippi from Pensacola, and his brave 
soldiers could not have returned to Pensacola on the ninth of 
January, two days after the fight. It must have been some French 
village between Pensacola and Mobile, and Mr. Hamilton, the 
author of "Colonial Mobile," a native Mobilian and a most pains- 
taking and reliable authority, says : "This was on the coast below 
where the Apalache or Tensaw River empties into Mobile Bay." 

After the fall of Mobile, Galvez went to Havana to secure 
reinforcements, and when these had arrived he appeared before 
Pensacola on the ninth of March, 1781, and two days later began 
the bombardment. This was continued, with some interruptions, 
for two months, when one of the powder magazines in the fort 
exploded, causing such devastation that the Spaniards were able 
to enter the fort in such numbers that further resistance was im- 
possible. Then Pensacola surrendered on the ninth of May upon 
the same conditions as Baton Rouge had done. The prisoners 
were sent to New York. In Pensacola 800 men fought against 
14,000, and Governor Galvez is said to have been greatly morti- 
fied when he heard that so small a number had resisted him for 
such a length of time. (See Die deutschen Huelfstruppen im 
Nordamerik, Befreiungskrieg," by Max von Eelking, Hannover, 
1883.) 

In Pensacola the German troops, to their great surprise, 
found a countryman among the Indian chiefs. His name was 
"Brandenstein," and he had deserted as a soldier from Waldeck. 
After a very eventful career, he had become a fullfledged Indian, 
and even a chief. He served as an interpreter between the Ger- 
mans and his tribe. 



Americana Germanica 

NEW SERIES 
MONOGRAPHS DEVOTED TO THE COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE 

Literary, Linguistic and Otlier Cultural Relations of 
Germany and America 



EDITOR 

MARION DEXTER LEARNED 

University of Pennsylvania 



CONTRIBUTING EDITORS 

H. C. G. Brandt Julius Goebel 

W. H. Carpenter J. T. Hatfield 

W. H. Carruth W. T. Hewett 

Hermann Collitz A. R. Hohlfeld 

Starr W. Cutting Hugo K. Schilling 

Daniel K. Dodge H. Schmidt-Wartenberg 

A. B. Faust Hermann Schoenfeld 

KuNO Francke Calvin Thomas 

Adolph Gerber H. S, White 
Henry Wood 



PHILADELPHIA 

AMERICANA GERMANICA PRESS 

Berlin New York Leipzig 

MAYER & MCLLER CARL A. STERN F. A. BROCKHAUS 

London Paris 

KEGAN, PAUL, TRENCH, TROBNER & CO., Ltd. H. Le SOUDIER 



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